This easy and quick garlic shrimp veggie pasta pan tastes delicious but doesn’t require a whole lot of effort. We make a scampi-ish lemon garlic butter sauce to cook everything in, but the key is all the fresh veggies and the succulent shrimp, every time.
We’re going to talk about this recipe plenty in a minute, but can we just talk about life for a second? Just a quick segue? Pretty sure you all won’t mind, given we have the “jump to recipe” button up there, but just checking.
I have an almost-five-year-old right now and he has been drawn DEEP into the dreaded Yellow Food Syndrome condition that affects kids everywhere. You all know. That thing where they don’t want to eat a damn thing that isn’t chicken nuggets, french fries, tater tots, or mac ‘n’ cheese. Pretty much that whole “kid’s menu” they hand you everywhere.
This is the kid who used to grab whole handfuls of my Wild Mushroom Rice Pilaf off my plate when he was smaller. Who grabbed slices of spicy radishes from our neighbors’ veggie trays, and stuffed himself senseless on any seasoned potato dish I ordered from any restaurant.
I show him episodes of Bluey where Bluey and Bingo are debating the value of edamame or spring rolls or any other various things. Scott and I both tear into our veggie dishes. We demonstrate all the veggies we like. We even steamed up some edamame with the appropriate spices and shoyu dip.
This kid of mine is stubborn, that’s for sure.
So, okay. Yellow food. Pasta is yellow. There are veggies that are yellow. We can hide a whole lot of veggies using cheese. We’ll work this out.
In the meantime, there is one dish with veggies that he’ll eat – we just hide a lot of the veggieness with a lemon garlic butter sauce, a sprinkling of parmesan, and a lot of pasta. And prawns.
This is one of those things I came up almost by accident. I had pasta, peppers, onion, and asparagus, and jumbo shrimp, and I felt like I could do something with that. Especially if I threw a little butter and lemon into the equation. I’d make it light and delicious and if my little picky eater turned his nose up at it, Scott and I would have lunch for a day or two.
Melted butter plus garlic and veggies, a little salt and pepper and Old Bay just for some zip, stir to combine, add some broth and lemon, and I started to feel pretty good about this dish.
And once we mixed in the shrimp and the cooked pasta and let everything cook through, it smelled and looked pretty fantastic. And the best thing happened.
My little picky eater dug in.
When we dished it up for the kiddo, he may have thought about griping, but then he tasted a shrimp. Then a noodle. And then he realized the flavor we’d created was pretty darn good, green food or not.
I snuck green food into my yellow food eater! If you have techniques for sneaking in other green foods, I’m SO willing to hear – please let me know!
In the meantime, enjoy our garlic shrimp veggie pasta!
Garlic Shrimp Veggie Pasta
Ingredients
- 8 oz pasta, Rotelli or other
- 1 lb frozen raw shrimp peeled, tails removed if possible
- 6 tbsp butter
- 5 cloves garlic peeled and minced
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 tsp Old Bay seasoning
- 16 oz mixed vegetables your choosing
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- 3 tbsp lemon juice
- 3 tbsp parmesan cheese
Instructions
- Bring a pot of salted water to boil. Cook the pasta until al dente, and then remove from the water and toss with a little butter to keep it from sticking.
- Rinse the shrimp and pat dry.
- Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, for 1-2 minutes.
- Add the vegetables and saute until cooked to your liking. We prefer them a little on the crunchy side, so we'll cook ours 4-5 minutes. Season lightly with salt, pepper, and Old Bay.
- Add the chicken broth and cook 2-3 more minutes. Add the lemon juice and add the shrimp and cook 3-5 minutes, or until the shrimp are pink and cooked through.
- Add the pasta to the skillet and toss to combine. Let the mixture cook an additional minute, or until everything is nicely warmed.
- Serve warm, topped with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese!
