Penne with shrimp and zucchini in tomato cream

Ingredients for 4 servings:

• 400 g king prawns
• 400g penne
• 200 ml cream
• 3 small zucchini with flowers
• 3 garlic cloves
• 3 tomatoes
• 1 spring onion(s)
• 1 shallot(s)
• 1 lemon(s), organic
• 100 ml white wine (Pinot Blanc)
• 2 tsp tomato paste
• ½ tsp sugar
• 1 tsp thyme leaves, fresh
• 10 basil leaves, fresh
• 2 tbsp Parmesan
• 1 tsp butter
• 5 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tsp sea salt

Instructions

Working time approx. 20 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 25 minutes; Total time approx. 45 minutes

First, wash the shrimp tails, pat them dry with a paper towel, and place them in a bowl. Rinse the lemon with hot water, dry it, and finely grate half of the zest. Add it to the shrimp. Be careful not to get any white part of the lemon, or the dish will turn bitter later. Carefully remove the blossoms from the local zucchini from the garden. If you don’t have any zucchini in your garden and therefore don’t get any blossoms when you buy them, that’s okay. The blossoms simply look beautiful. Wash the zucchini and cut them into pieces about 1 cm wide. Add the zucchini to the bowl with the shrimp. Peel the garlic cloves and press two into the shrimp and zucchini. Add three tablespoons of olive oil and the thyme leaves and mix well. Let everything marinate for at least 15 minutes. Peel the shallot and cut it into small dice. Chop the roots off the spring onion and then trim off the lower white and light green parts. Save the green parts; you’ll need them later. Halve the lower part lengthwise and dice everything as well. Peel the last garlic clove and slice it very thinly. Place the pan on the stove and let it get really hot. Add two tablespoons of olive oil to the pan and sear the shrimp and zucchini on all sides. After about 3 minutes, remove the shrimp and zucchini from the pan and set them aside. Reduce the heat to low and add the butter to the pan along with the shallot, diced spring onion, garlic, sea salt, and sugar. Sauté everything for about 5 minutes; you don’t want it to brown. Now you can put the water on the boil for the pasta. When the water is boiling, add plenty of salt and add the penne. Since the pasta will continue to simmer in the sauce for a short time, cook for one minute less than the package indicates. When the pasta is ready, drain it through a sieve. If you want to finish the dish later, cook the pasta for two minutes less than the package indicates. When the cooking time is up, drain the pasta through a sieve and rinse it with cold water until it is completely cool. Add the tomato paste to the pan and increase the heat to a higher level. After about 3 minutes, deglaze with the white wine and reduce the liquid by a third. Then add the cream and grated Parmesan cheese and simmer everything on low heat with the lid closed for 5 minutes until the pasta is done. If you want to finish the dish later, you can turn off the heat now. Remove the stem ends and the seeds from the tomatoes, then dice them. Pluck the leaves off the zucchini blossom and tear them up a bit; you can’t use the inside. Cut the basil leaves into strips and the green part of the spring onion into fine rings. To finish the dish, first bring the sauce to a simmer in the pan. Then simply follow the remaining steps. When the pasta is ready, add it to the sauce, increase the heat to high, and toss everything together well. After a minute, add the shrimp, zucchini, and diced tomatoes, and toss everything together again. After another minute, add the basil, zucchini blossoms, and spring onion rings. Toss again, taste, and serve immediately.