Cajun Pasta

[ladyknight1]

Cajun Pasta             6 servings

1lb large shrimp (frozen, uncooked preferred unless you catch them yourself)
1lb chicken sausage links
1-3 teaspoons olive oil
2 ripe bell peppers, sliced into strips
1 sweet onion, sliced into strips
1lb pasta of your choice
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese
Parmesan for sprinkling before serving

Sauce:
1/2 cup half & half
1/2 cup milk or buttermilk
juice from 1/2 lemon
lemon zest
chives or scallions
1 tsp Cajun seasoning
salt & pepper

Bring water in large saucepan to boil. Add pasta, and sausage 5 minutes before pasta is done, shrimp three minutes before pasta is done. Cook pasta to al dente, Drain pasta, sausage, and shrimp. Slice cooled sausage into 1/4" rounds.

Heat skillet over medium-high heat, add olive oil until shimmering. Add vegetables, sprinkle with salt and stir frequently until partially softened. Remove vegetables to plate. Add sauce ingredients to pan and simmer until lightly thickened, add mozzarella off heat and stir to combine. Combine pasta, sausage, shrimp, vegetables and sauce. Let cook for a few minutes to combine flavors. Serve with a sprinkling of Parmesan.

[menley]

Where does the 1/2 cup of mozzarella come in?

[ladyknight1]

When making the sauce, I will edit the recipe.

[veryfluffy]

The problem with posting American recipes is that some of the ingredients that you might take for granted often don't exist other places, or might be called something else.

1lb large shrimp -- that's prawns in the UK. Shrimp are very small only.

1lb chicken sausage links -- nope! never seen chicken sausage here.

1/2 cup half & half -- do you know what the fat % of this is? Is it like single cream (15%)?

1 tsp Cajun seasoning -- not sure if I have seen this anywhere, since Cajun food isn't really well known. What are the constituent seasonings?

[/quote]

[ladyknight1]

Yes, single cream is very similar to our half & half. Cajun seasoning consists of cayenne pepper, black pepper, garlic and onion powders. As for the chicken sausage, you could substitute pork or beef. The shrimp or prawns would be 15-25 to the pound for the right size.

[menley]

Thanks!

Veryfluffy, I've experienced the same thing - I recently moved to Europe and have had an interesting time adapting my American recipes Half-and-half was the first problem I came up against!  I generally mix 3 parts 10% cream to 1 part 20% cream to get my recipes to come out exactly like they did in the US.