Homemade Shrimp Wraps
This speedy, satisfying dinner is big in flavor—just the way we like it! Crisp, crunchy lettuce makes a light, fresh bed for the most flavorful shrimp we’ve eaten. The shrimp is cooked in a soy sauce and honey-garlic sauté sauce and is ready in a flash. We’re making a side of White Rice and Red Cabbage and Apple Slaw to make this tasty dinner.
What’s Sticky Shrimp?
Sticky Shrimp is coated in a sweet-savory-spicy sauce that hits all the spots, and because it has cornstarch, honey and brown sugar in it, it really does stick to the shrimp—it coats them in the best way. Here’s what you’ll need to make these delightfully sticky, speedy sautéed shrimp:
Soy sauce and sesame oil – These will deliver a deep savory and umami note, and they love shrimp! Check out our recipe for Garlic Shrimp Stir Fry.
Chili sauce, like sambal oelek – Have you noticed that this is the secret to success in many of our recipes? We love adding a little flash of heat to Sesame Garlic Ramen Noodles and Kung Pao Chicken.
Brown sugar and honey – Let’s turn the sweetness up for these sticky shrimp lettuce wraps with both brown sugar and honey for a golden glow.
Fresh garlic and ginger – Because, flavor.
Cornstarch – This helps thicken the sauce. If you don’t have cornstarch on hand, you can use potato starch or all-purpose flour.
What Is The Best Lettuce for Making Lettuce Wraps? Drumroll, Please!
We’ve covered this before, but the very best lettuce on earth for making shrimp lettuce wraps is, hands down, butter lettuce! AKA bibb lettuce, AKA Boston bibb lettuce, this buttery, tender lettuce is ideal for making lettuce wraps because of its cupped shape and relative sturdiness. We also love that it has a nice flavor—no bitterness at all, just a nice mild sweetness to compliment the sticky shrimp. A salad spinner would be helpful here, but is not necessary.
How to Clean Shrimp
Time to get your hands dirty! Learning how to peel and devein shrimp can seem like a daunting task, but it’s really pretty simple. Also, it’s not technically necessary to devein your shrimp, so if you want to skip it, you can. The “vein” is the shrimp’s digestive tract, and it can have a little sand or grit in it sometimes, so we like to remove it.
Defrost! Defrost your shrimp in a bowl of cold water in the fridge.
Peel! Drain the shrimp. Begin to peel the shrimp by holding the shrimp in one hand and use your other hand to peel off the legs. Once the legs have been removed, you can take the shrimp shell off by peeling it, beginning from where you took off the legs.
To keep the tail on—we like to leave the shrimp tail-on— just hold it firmly in place with one hand while you peel the shell of the body of the shrimp with your other hand.
To remove the vein, hold the shrimp with the back side up. Use a sharp, small knife (like a paring knife) or a shrimp deveiner to make a shallow cut along the vein (the dark line that runs along the back of the shrimp). Once you've made the incision, use the tip of the knife to scrape out the vein.
Done! Time to get cooking!
More Speedy Shrimp Recipes to Try
Now that you’re a shrimp cleaning pro, you might be feeling emboldened to branch out and cook more shrimp! We’re all for that. Here are a few shrimp recipes we’ve been making a lot lately:
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