Camarones con Mojo de Ajo

This size shrimp seems to give the best balance between cost and size. Frying the garlic not only infuses the oil, but makes the resultant slices mild and crispy. Frying the shrimp shells just pours more flavor into the oil, which we'll enjoy later.

Ingredients

1 lb raw shrimp, with shells (size: 31-40 count)
1 cup milk
1 cup cooking oil
10 cloves garlic, peeled, sliced thin (more is always better!)
1 cup AP flour
salt & pepper
fresh cilantro
2 limes

Method

Peel the shrimp, reserve shells and tails. Soak peeled shrimp in the milk for an hour. Now peel all your garlic and slice it up:

Heat the oil in a large skillet using medium heat. When hot, add in the sliced garlic and fry. Stir the garlic around, cooking it until it just stars to brown around the edges. Remove the garlic from the oil and save. Dry the shrimp shells and tails well, then add them to the hot oil.


Stir the shells around, turning them over once, so as to infuse the oil with all the 'shrimpyness' of the shells, about 3 minutes. Remove and discard all the shells and tails.

When done, remove all the garlic and shell pieces from the oil with a slotted spoon, then return skillet to heat. Reserve the garlic slices, and discard shrimp shells.

Put the flour in a shallow dish, mixing in salt and pepper to taste. A few at a time, remove the soaked shrimp from the milk and dredge in the flout to coat well. Cook all the shrimp in the hot garlic/shrimp oil until done, about 90 seconds per side.

Remove cooked shrimp and serve with prepared rice, drizzling some of the cooking oil over shrimp and rice.

Below it's garnished with the fried garlic slices and fresh cilantro. Serve with quartered lime sections.

Makes four servings of shrimpy goodness.