Rosemary Shrimp with Garden Mint Pesto and Cucumber Ribbon & Tomato Balsamic Salad

Continuing my quest to use my abundance of garden herbs, I searched 

the internet for something that involved mint.

I got a two-fer....

Rosemary shrimp with mint pesto!

Pretty simple really. 

I went rouge from the recipe, cause the shrimp kept falling 

apart when I attempted to skewer the shrimp with a sprig of 

rosemary.  Shrimp just aren't thick enough

to stand up to my massive rosemary.

Its genetics, I can't help it.

Instead, I just put the rosemary on a baking sheet and placed the shrimp

on top of it.  Much less stress.

Garlic, lemon, cilantro and olive oil was whisked in a bowl

and then I tossed the deveined and cleaned shrimp and left 

them to marinate.

Note:  lemon will begin to COOK shrimp if you leave it too long.

I did this, but it wasn't a deal breaker.  You can see it in this 

photo....the white portions have begun to cook due to the lemon in the

marinade.  Having said that, it still turned out awesome!

Mint pesto!  Tons of mint, feta, garlic, toasted pine nuts, parmesan and

salt and pepper created this creamy wonderfulness.

I could sip this from the bowl and be happily 

fulfilled as a meal...but that's just me.

In fact, I "chef tested" this quite a few times, and after 

the first, I knew I had the right proportions, but somehow

I still needed to stay in the lab and test it.

To pair with this awesome shrimp dish, I chose something that tastes much better

than it looks, ribbon cucumber and tomato salad.  The idea seemed great.

Use a potato peeler to create ribbons of cucumbers and pair it with both red 

and yellow tomatoes, as well as feta cheese.

I chose to make this a balsamic vinaigrette, and that is where I think 

I went wrong.  The taste was good, however, the balsamic turned the ribbons and 

the yellow tomatoes into a brownish color.  Duh, its balsamic dude!

Here is a close up of the salad.  Believe it or not, there are

fresh ribbons of cucumbers that were white when I used a

peeler to create them.  The visual COULD 

have been better, but the taste rocked.

Having said all those negative things, this meal was awesome!

This was the best pesto I've ever made.

2 out of 3 of the flock was extremely pleased with this meal

and we will be eating it again.

Zachary had left over chicken.  He did, however, dip it in the leftover pesto!

Flock fed!