Begorra, You Saucy Thing!

In 2006, Richie and I, with friends, did a tour of Ireland. We started in Dublin and ended in Shannon from whence we flew home.

In Dublin, we ate two meals in the same restaurant in the student-infested area near the university. We ate there twice because I fell in love with the Piri Piri Prawns. I have kept that restaurant's business card somewhere in my office ever since, thinking that if I ever make it back to Dublin, I will go straight from the airport to the restaurant. Let me know if you're going to Dublin anytime soon and I'll dig through many layers of "stuff" and find it for you.

What the hell are Piri Piri Prawns? They're big, fat grilled shrimp in a garlic-y hot sauce, served with chunks of baguette to soak up this incredible sauce.

Recently I ran across British chef Jamie Oliver's recipe for Piri Piri sauce. He used it with chicken so clearly chicken is an acceptable substitute for shrimp.

PIRI PIRI SAUCE
1 red onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic - hell, use six!
1 or 2 bird's eye chilis -- the tiny ROARINGLY HOT ones
2 T sweet smoked paprika
Juice of two lemons
1/4 cup of white vinegar
2 T Worcestershire sauce
optional basil to sprinkle over finished sauce.
Mix and heat all of the above, store in a jar in the refrigerator if not planning to use it immediately.

Oliver says to use a Cuisinart, but ours is a mini-cuisinart, so it would have to be done in batches. If your situation is the same, plan ahead for the time you'll need to batch it.

Piri Piri chilis are indiginous to Malawi, South Africa, Ghana, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique. It is a member of the Capiscum genus and ranks 175,000 on the Scoville unit measuring system