Thai Shrimp & Vegetable Skewers

It’s the beginning of spring here in New Zealand, and I thought that the worst of the weather was behind us until I woke up the other morning and there was a layer of frost on our deck, which also carpeted the lawn like snow. Thankfully the weekend weather was far less gloomy, so we decided to make the most of the sunny weather and dust off the barbecue for a bit of grilling.

When I was growing up in Australia barbecues were very meat-centric. In fact our family barbecues were practically a meat lovefest! To accompany all this meat we’d typically have heavily buttered bread rolls and a basic salad. Not exactly the most balanced of meals, that’s for sure.

The sort of barbecue food Ric and I typically enjoy these days is still steak — except it’s tuna and salmon steaks instead of beef steaks, and shrimp and scallops instead of sausages. This isn’t simply a health decision though, we actually enjoy the taste and texture of these foods much more than meat.

Vegetables also play a much more prominent role compared to the barbecues of my childhood. We always save plenty of room on the grill for vegetables like bell peppers, onion, eggplant, mushrooms and zucchini. And salads aren’t an afterthought, they’re an integral part of the barbecue for us. In fact we always make up at least two salads to go a long with the grilled foods.

Our barbecues generally have a cultural theme as well. We’ll either base the grilled foods and salads on a particular Mediterranean or Asian cuisine (such as Italian, Greek, Spanish, Japanese or Chinese), or have a combination of Mediterranean and Asian grilled foods and salads.

Over the weekend we decided to have a pan-Asian theme for our barbecue. The centerpiece was delicately-spiced Thai shrimp and vegetable skewers, which we accompanied with a Chinese-style noodle salad (made with transparent bean thread noodles) and a simple Vietnamese-style coleslaw. We washed this down with ice cold Tiger beer from Singapore. So our taste buds certainly got to enjoy a trip around Asia.

Here’s the recipe for the skewers, and I’ll post the salad recipes in the near future. Also I quickly wanted to let you know that I was interviewed by Lovelyn from The Art of Balanced Living blog recently, and if you want to check it out here’s the link.

Thai Shrimp & Vegetable Skewers

Shrimp, red bell pepper and zucchini skewers marinated in a Thai green curry sauce and grilled until tender and succulent.

• 6 bamboo or wooden skewers - soaked for 5 minutes in cold water
• 1/2 cup coconut milk
• 2 teaspoons Thai green curry paste
• 2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 teaspoon brown sugar
• 2 cloves garlic - minced
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped cilantro (fresh coriander)
• 24 large shrimp - peeled and deveined
• 2 zucchinis - cut into thick rounds
• 1 red pepper - cut into small pieces

IN a small bowl dissolve the curry paste with 1 tablespoon of boiling water. ADD the coconut milk, fish sauce, brown sugar, garlic, lemon juice, salt and cilantro, and mix to combine. THREAD alternating shrimp and vegetables onto the skewers, then marinate them in the mixture, covered, in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. COOK the skewers on a hot grill for 10 minutes, turning and brushing regularly with the marinade. SERVE with lemon or lime wedges for squeezing.

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