The Word of the Day IS...

Well...talk about a dinner that couldn't be FURTHER from a simple taco salad:)  Last night's dinner was one of the more 'unique' dishes that we've had in awhile!  We made Thai Shrimp Curry with Chopped Lettuce and Basil-Lime Couscous....

This was SUCHHHHHHHH a QUICK dinner!  The hardest part was chopping up the roasted peppers:)  You mixed the peppers with the shrimp, 5 cloves of garlic, 4 chopped scallions and a little ginger, salt and pepper to saute for a few minutes until the shrimp is cooked...

Next, you got to the "Thai" portion, by adding a cup of lite unsweetened coconut milk and the curry paste.  And even though the recipe called for 2 tablespoons...I wimped out and only used ONE.  But if you like HOT, HOT, HOT...by all means, knock yourself out with those 2 (or more) spoonfuls;)

You cooked the curry for a few minutes before adding in the peas...and WALLAH!  DONE!  :)

Meanwhile, we cooked a cup of couscous in chicken broth and then added a cup of chopped basil and about 2 tablespoons of lime juice.  Your couscous becomes layer ONE:

OK...this is where they lost me a bit, but the chopped lettuce is layer TWO.  I've never HEARD of a dish with a lettuce layer like this....but maybe it's sorta a big deal in Thai cooking??  Not sure:)

And finally, we capped off the layers with the shrimp/pepper/pea curry mixture and the very IMPORTANT layer of chopped cashews;)  (I <3 cashews:)

I said "unique," right?? :)  The textures of this dish are what made it the most....unique:)  The light couscous, mixed with the even lighter lettuce, capped with the light shrimp and curry topping.   This is a dish that does NOT weigh you down...mostly because it's hard to find any real substance:)   It had a very 'air-y' quality, all while leaving a BITE from the curry paste:)  VERY tasty...just very (here's that word again!) unique:)

And to add just a litttttle more 'substance'....we decided to try out this little number I got at the 'Joe's yesterday....

Lentils were my SINGLE. LEAST. FAVORITE. FOOD growing up.  SOMEWHERE my Grandmother is shaking her head that I free willingly bought an item that contained those lentils that I used to cry over having to eat;) hahahahahhahahahahha.....

Buttttt.....as a dip, the lentils were pretty darn tasty!  They were ground up with paprika, coriander, cumin, curry, brown sugar and cardamom...SPICE-A! :)  We had it with a shared piece of the Garlic Naan....

Yet another unique element to this dinner:)  This was definitely a step on the more "exotic" side for us:)  However, I may have to take a few MORE steps as now I need to find ways to use up the rest of my can of curry paste;)  hahahhahahahah....THAT will keep it interesting for sure!

Well...I think I'm putting Delores to work again to get started on a portion of our dinner a little earlier today:)  Should be yet ANOTHER unique one...stay tuned;)