Shrimp Cucumber and Jicama Aquachile

 

I went to visit my friend, Cathy Zehner, in Newport Beach and she took me to Las Brisas Restaurant in Laguna Beach.  I was trying to decide what to order on the menu and asked the server what was better:  the Tuna Poke or the White Shrimp and Crab Ceviche.  I love both so it was hard to decide.  She said they were both excellent but just changed their Ceviche recipe a few weeks ago and it is now in an Aquachile sauce and is really good.  I said "Great!  I'll have that."   Then Cathy asked me what Aquachile was and I said I don't know.  The direct translation is obviously chile water but I've never had it before so I don't really know what it is.  

Well when it came it was one of the best things I've ever tasted.  I could not get over the smooth heat and the fresh taste.  I asked the server if she could please ask what was in it.  She came back and told me there were only four ingredients in the sauce:  Lime Juice, Serrano Chiles, Cilantro and Salt.  I was determined to recreate it as I couldn't get it off of my mind.

The recipe at Las Brisas had crab in it also but I made mine with just shrimp.  Also, even though I eat tons of sushi and other raw fish and eat steak tartare, tuna tartare and raw beef carpaccio, I do not eat raw shrimp.  If you'll note when you are in a sushi bar that the shrimp is always poached, not raw.  And while I know that the acid in the lime or lemon juice cooks the halibut, scallops and other fish generally used in ceviche, I prefer to poach the shrimp.  I've only had food poisoning once in my life and that was in college in Washington DC and it was from bad shrimp.  I still eat shrimp all the time but that is my reason for cooking it.  

My directions for gently poaching shrimp are important to follow from a taste standpoint.  For Shrimp cocktail I poach the shrimp gently in a court boullion but for the various ceviches I make I just poach in salted water.