Turn your shrimp shells into another
delicious dish.

In Japan, the shells are battered and grilled as a crunchy appetizer. But that’s not what we’re suggesting—yet.

The shrimp shells add lovely flavor to a variety of dishes:

Make a simple shrimp stock by covering shrimp shells with water in a saucepan. Add a bay leaf and 6 peppercorns and simmer for 20 minutes. Reduce the stock for a more intense flavor.

You can now use the stock for several purposes, including:

• As a poaching liquid for mild white fish
• To add shrimp flavor to a soup (substitute the stock for an equal amount of water in the recipe)
• As a cooking liquid for rice and pasta (in seafood-based dishes)

If you don’t want to make stock, you can add the whole shells to a soup or cooking water and strain them out. You can keep the shells in the freezer until you’re ready to use them. And you can do all of the above with lobster shells as well.

You can grill the shells Japanese-style or oven-roast them. We found this suggestion from a Chowhound reader:

Roast the shrimp shells in the oven at 350°F until pink. Add the roasted shells with some minced garlic to melted butter and make shrimp-flavored garlic toast.

One friend tells us that the dog and cat fight over the shells, cooked or uncooked!

• Find shrimp recipes in our Seafood Section.