Spaghetti with Shrimp in Gorgonzola Sauce

Spaghetti with Shrimp in Gorgonzola Cheese Sauce

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I love spaghetti with shrimp and often make it using all sorts of recipes. The most interesting way to make a quick breakfast is to boil spaghetti or another pasta and make a simple sauce at the same time. The whole process usually takes 20-30 mins. Dishes like this really save us in the morning, when there is not much time to prepare breakfast.

Spaghetti is the most common pasta in the world. Long ago spaghetti was not the length it is now, although long pasta is still sometimes sold. These are thin strands about 2 mm across, without a hole in the middle. There are thick varieties, spaghettoni, thin ones, spaghettini, and even very thin ones, capellini. They come from different parts of Italy and are served with particular sauces, although as a rule they differ only in thickness.

Of all the variety of spaghetti sauces, I like tomato best, then the simplest one, oil with garlic (aglio e olio), and a cream sauce with Gorgonzola or another blue cheese, not always Italian. To the last kind of sauce I often add seafood, and it turns out really tasty. I do not add herbs to these sauces, I only garnish them with sprigs of basil.

Shrimp are sold everywhere now, and we are used to them. “Gray” raw shrimp are quite rare in stores, and what is sold are coral-red ones. These are sea creatures that have already been cooked: they are boiled right after being caught, then packed and frozen. They do not need any special preparation. Just put them in a deep bowl and cover with boiling water. In a few minutes they will thaw and the water will cool down.

The best result comes from making the sauce with Gorgonzola. You can use Roquefort, which is fairly firm and blends well into the sauce. Soft blue cheeses such as Dorblu and Danablu make the sauce too thin.

The whole point of a cheese sauce for spaghetti is melting the cheese in hot milk or cream. Such sauces suit more than pasta: they are also very good with chicken fried in pieces and with fish. When the sauce is ready, the shrimp and spices are added to it. When serving, you can leave the pasta and sauce unmixed, but the dish must be very hot.

More with shrimp

Ingredients

2 servings

  • Spaghetti 160 g
  • Water for boiling the pasta 2-2.5 l
  • Salt for boiling the pasta 10-13 g
  • Shrimp (unpeeled) 150 g
  • Gorgonzola (or another blue cheese) 120 g
  • Milk 70 ml
  • Tomato (optional) 1
  • Basil 1-2 sprigs
  • Salt, black pepper to taste

Step-by-step recipe

Shrimp

  1. Spaghetti with shrimp cooks quickly, so you can boil the pasta and make the sauce at the same time. You can also use ready-peeled shrimp meat from the store.

  2. Put the frozen shrimp in a large bowl and cover with boiling water from a kettle. They will thaw in 5-6 mins.

  3. Drain the water and peel the shrimp.

    Cheese and seafood.

Pasta

  1. Bring 2-2.5 l of water to a boil in a large pot and add salt at 5 g per liter of water.

  2. Add the spaghetti to the boiling water. A serving is generally considered to be 80-85 g of dry pasta. A half-kilogram package of spaghetti makes six servings.

    Spaghetti.

  3. Cook the pasta until done. The cooking time is given on the package, and the manufacturer guarantees al dente within that time. Drain the cooked spaghetti in a colander.

Sauce

  1. While the water comes to a boil and the pasta cooks, make the sauce.

  2. In a small saucepan over medium heat, warm 70 ml of regular milk. That is roughly a third of a cup. You can use cream instead of milk.

  3. When the milk starts to boil, crumble the blue cheese into it. Reduce the heat to low. Stirring constantly, cook the sauce until the cheese has completely blended with the milk. The mixture will be somewhat thick, like sour cream, a little like a thin custard.

    Cheese sauce.

  4. Taste the sauce, add salt if needed (Gorgonzola is salty) and season well with black pepper.

  5. If you like, add a tomato to the sauce; this is handy when you have prepared only a few shrimp. Remove the skin from the tomato (you can scald it for this) and remove the seeds. Cut the flesh into cubes.

  6. Add the tomato and peeled shrimp to the sauce. Stir and let the sauce simmer for 1-2 mins over low heat.

    Sauce with seafood.

Serving

  1. Put the hot spaghetti on a pasta plate. Pour the cheese sauce with shrimp over the pasta. It is better not to mix the pasta and sauce, but to do it while eating.

  2. Garnish the dish with sprigs of basil.

    spaghetti with shrimp

  3. Serve the spaghetti with shrimp in cheese sauce right away while it is hot. If you like, add more pepper just before serving.

    Along with shrimp, you can also use a “seafood cocktail” mix.

Calories and macros

580 kcal

Serving ≈ 350 g

  • Protein34 g24% of kcal
  • Fat20 g32% of kcal
  • Carbs62 g44% of kcal

100 g168 kcalProtein 9.7 gFat 5.8 gCarbs 18 g

Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.

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