CLASSIC SHRIMP COCKTAIL

SEASON 1, EPISODE 4

“New Amsterdam”

One evening Trudy and Pete Campbell join Trudy’s well-to-do parents, Tom and Jeannie Vogel, at a Manhattan restaurant for dinner. They begin with appetizers. When Trudy, every ounce Daddy’s little girl, announces she has “great news,” her mother, delightfully surprised, answers, “Already?” It’s not what she thinks. Trudy isn’t pregnant; she and Pete have found an apartment they can’t afford on 83rd Street. When Tom offers to help with the rent, Pete thanks him but, contrary to Trudy’s wishes, says they’d rather wait.

“For what?” barks Tom. “Start your life already. You’re gonna be a rich bastard on your own someday and waiting is a bunch of bullshit.”

Good advice, especially when you’re staring, as Trudy is, at the shrimp cocktail she’s ordered.

Appetizers made with shellfish topped with or dipped in a spicy tomato-based sauce and served in small cups were popular in the United States beginning in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but we owe the cocktail in shrimp cocktail to Prohibition in the 1920s. If you couldn’t drink a cocktail—not legally, anyway—you could at least eat one and make good use of your stemware in the process.

Oysters (see Grand Central Oyster Bar’s Oysters Rockefeller) were initially the most common shellfish used in such appetizers, but shrimp, less popular at the turn of the twentieth century, was growing in popularity thanks to Cajun and Creole recipes from the Gulf Coast, where Tabasco, a product of Louisiana, was used to liven up the sauce. As shrimp became more commonplace (and the ability to transport them across distances while keeping them fresh improved), the shrimp cocktail—with the shrimp curled around the lip of a cocktail glass—became a nationwide phenomenon. Refreshing, tangy, and light, it’s a classic that is still in style. This shrimp recipe is from The James Beard Cookbook by James Beard (1961), and the cocktail sauce is from a cookbook often seen on Betty Draper’s kitchen counter, The Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook (1962).

Fresh, shelled shrimp, tail on, are the easy part; the magic is in the cocktail sauce. We don’t think we’re alone in believing that the shrimp are just a vehicle for delivering the savory sauce. But don’t wait for Trudy to start. Waiting is…well, Tom said it best.

Classic Shrimp Cocktail

SHRIMP FROM THE JAMES BEARD COOKBOOK BY JAMES BEARD (DUTTON, 1961); COCKTAIL SAUCE FROM BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS NEW COOKBOOK (MEREDITH, 1962)

For the shrimp

36 medium-large shrimp

1 thick slice lemon

3 sprigs parsley

1 peeled onion

3–4 peppercorns

1 teaspoon salt

For the cocktail sauce

³⁄₄ cup chili sauce

2–3 tablespoons horseradish

2–3 tablespoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

1 teaspoon grated onion

¹⁄₄ teaspoon salt

Few drops of Tabasco sauce

Finely chopped celery, optional

Lettuce, for serving, optional

1. Prepare the shrimp: Shrimp may be shelled and cleaned before or after cooking, by peeling off the shell, rinsing off any grit, and removing the black vein down the back. Leave shrimp tails intact.
2. Pour enough water to cover the shrimp in a saucepan. Add lemon, parsley, onion, peppercorns, and salt. Bring to a boil and add the shrimp. Simmer for 3–5 minutes, depending on the size, until shrimp are pink and cooked through. Do not overcook. Drain and chill shrimp until ready to serve.
3. Make cocktail sauce: Combine all cocktail sauce ingredients in a small bowl. Mix and refrigerate.
4. To serve as individual appetizers, mix shrimp with finely chopped celery if desired) and serve in lettuce-lined sherbet glasses. For a party snack, fill a large bowl with crushed ice and center with a small bowl of cocktail sauce; arrange shrimp over ice. Top with finely chopped celery (if desired). Serve with wooden picks for dipping shrimp into sauce.

YIELD: 6 SERVINGS