September 10, 2025 • 45 mins
Have you ever paid $60 for a total of nine gently poached shrimp? Or are you a financially responsible person on whom your family relies? In this episode of Restaurant People, Hannah and Bryan settle in with Infatuation Senior Editor Jonathan Smith for an exhaustive investigation of America’s sweetheart, and the silliest food imaginable: shrimp cocktail. It’s cold shrimp. It’s ketchup and horseradish. We can’t get enough.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
- Hannah, we have had alot of shrimp cocktail
over the past, I want to say two weeks.
- Yeah.- Just last night
we went to two restaurants,had two shrimp cocktails.
Spent a total of around probably 50, $60
on a total of nine cocktail shrimp.
- Bryan, I think we got to talk about
why we're paying for shrimp cocktail
and why I will continue topay for it till the day I die.
(00:22):
- Absolutely.
I think today we are going
to do an exhaustiveinvestigation on why people
are ordering shrimp cocktail.
Who's ordering shrimp cocktail?
- Everyone.- And why shrimp cocktail?
Just broadly, why?
- Yeah. Why?- It's luxurious.
It's not as expensive as caviar.
Maybe that's it. Maybe that's the appeal.
- Is shrimp cocktailthe poor man's caviar?
(00:44):
- Well, it's definitelynot for poor people
'cause it's so expensive.
- You're right about that.
Hey, you shrimp lovers.
This is Infatuations Restaurant People.
The show for people who eatat restaurants sometimes.
- I'm Hannah Albertine,senior editor at Infatuation
and woman who is dressed like a shrimp.
- I'm Brian Kim, editoriallead at Infatuation NYC.
(01:06):
And I think shrimp tastesbetter than they smell.
Today on Restaurant People,
we're talking about shrimp cocktail.
The appetizer is everywhere,but should it be anywhere?
- Is ordering shrimp cocktail a good idea?
Financially, emotionally?We're going to talk about it.
- On today's episode,we'll be joined in studio
by guest Jonathan Smith,Infatuation editor
and shrimp cocktailenthusiast to eat some shrimp
(01:27):
and talk about what about shrimp cocktail
gets us every single time.
- And we'll also talk aboutour favorite shrimp cocktails
and where you can find them.
- All this and more on today'sepisode of Restaurant People.
Hannah, are you ready to get shrimpy?
- I'm so ready.- Me too
- Restaurant People,
we have a very special guest this episode,
(01:49):
senior editor, shrimpcocktail watchdog, your friend
and mine, welcome Jonathan.
- Thank you. Thanks for having me.
- We're so excited you're here.
I can't believe your family of shrimps
let you come on this podcast.
- I know, it's wild.
I was able to escape the net and I'm here.
- Aw.- Jonathan Raised by shrimp
in the Gulf of Mexico.
Jonathan, you see what's in front of us?
(02:11):
- It's a shrimp cocktail.
- It's called shrimp cocktail actually.
Why is it there?
Because this whole episode
is going to be about shrimp cocktail.
Everybody just take thetime to say the word shrimp.
Jonathan, can I get a shrimp?
- Shrimp.
- Shrimp. Shrimp.
- Shrimp.- Ooh.
- Now what do you have to tell us about
shrimp cocktail Jonathan?
(02:32):
- I have spent a lot of timethinking about shrimp cocktail
over the years, and Ithink there are a few foods
that kind of fall into the same category,
but shrimp cocktail is verydependent on your environment.
I think.
You know, I feel likeyou can have the exact
same shrimp cocktailin two different places
and it can be eitherhorrible or mind blowing.
(02:54):
- Do you think that's right, Bryan?
- Yeah. Okay, I'll buy that for now.
- Yeah, I'm in.- Yeah.
- Yeah.
Well, I mean, thisenvironment is pretty similar
to where we normally eatshrimp cocktail, right?
With cameras.
- We eat shrimp cocktail inall kinds of environments.
Hannah and I have at shrimp cocktail
at least three times this week.
- Wow!- [Hannah] True. Yeah.
- Wow.
(03:14):
- We've shrimped in highplaces and low ones.
And now we're going to shrimp with you.
I mean, it's only fair,
like we had to offeryou some shrimp cocktail
on the shrimp cocktail episode.
- It looks delicious.
- We are looking at a martini glass
full of cocktail sauce
with seven beautifulcurled shrimps coming out.
(03:36):
Sort of like water fallingout of the top of the glass.
And there's a nice lemon wedgethat is placed on the rim.
And actually, Bryan,
I want to quote something you said
in our earlier martini episode.
- Yes, please.- Which was,
"Anything that comes in amartini glass is a martini."
- I did say that.- So are we looking
at a martini right now?- This is a shrimp-tini.
(03:58):
This is a shrimp martini.
- Don't mind if I do.
Tell me, Jonathan, is this presentation,
the glass full of cocktail sauce,
is that something you've seen personally
in your shrimp cocktail research?
- I haven't seen it ina clear cocktail glass
in quite a while.- [Hannah] Okay.
- I had a shrimp cocktail at Randazzo's
(04:20):
in Sheepshed Bay about a week ago.
That was in a kind of likemetal coop that was like,
you know, sort of cocktail shaped.
But not clear.
And I think this is a classy
presentation that we have right here.
- It's really good.
- Yeah, having had shrimp cocktail,
I would say probably sixtimes in the past two weeks.
It's generally how you described it
in a metal container with ice.
(04:42):
The shrimp is on the ice, andthen you have a lemon wedge,
and then you have cocktailsauce on the side.
This I think is more ofan old school presentation
and the martini emitting the ice.
Either way, a legitimate shrimp cocktail,
all the important elements are there.
Sauce, shrimp, lemon.
- And you know what,notably it is still cold,
which is an essentialpart of a shrimp cocktail.
Like if you're eating anyshrimp that feels even tepid,
(05:06):
you don't want it.
That is not a good shrimp cocktail.
It's a recipe for disaster.
- Cold, but not too cold.Am I right Jonathan?
- I, it would be hard for me.
I mean, frozen, you don't want.
But I think like, youknow, anything below that
is good with me.
- You want ice?- I would like ice.
- Yeah.
Because it's like, oh myGod, it's this precious
little dainty, adorable foodthat needs to be chilled.
(05:27):
Or is it like ice is kindof a luxurious thing?
Or is it like sensitiveto health concerns?
- I think it's maybe a littlebit of all of those things.
It's a dish that's meant to be eaten
and encourage you to eat it faster.
You don't want to wait forthe ice to melt, you know,
then you got like water on your table.
It's like you got to justlike keep eating it, you know?
- I've seen pebble ice lately.
(05:48):
Seems to be the shrimp cocktailcontemporary choice for ice.
I've seen crushed whereit's like almost the texture
of water ice, sorry.
Italian ice for non Philadelphians.
- I know what water iceis. Don't talk down to me.
Yeah, I think that pebble iceis definitely a better call.
It's going to melt slower.
It's not going to make your shrimp watery.
(06:09):
- I really wanted to do anepisode on shrimp cocktail
because I think it's a really silly food.
It's cold shrimp and it's ketchup
and I pay a lot of money to eat it.
And I know it's alwaysa bad financial decision
and I can't seem to stop.
- It's a very silly food.
It's a very 1950s dinnerparty food, I would say.
(06:32):
There's something inherentlyfunny just about shrimp.
- Look at them.
- Hannah and I have been obsessedwith shrimp for years now,
but she definitely likesshrimp cocktail more than I do.
- Why? What's your problem?- It's just like,
it seems like such areckless use of money.
And I can think of so many other ways.
I would rather eat shrimp.
That said, I do enjoy a shrimp cocktail.
I'm not sure I wantone entirely to myself.
(06:52):
I think it should be shared.
- I disagree. I'm so happy toeat shrimp cocktail by myself.
In fact, I enjoy, I relisha solo shrimp cocktail.
It's similar to when you'reeating mozzarella sticks.
Like you would never eatsix naked mozzarella sticks.
Like pull apart.
You'd eat six pull apart string cheese.
(07:14):
- Oh, I thought you said mozzarella...
- I'm making my point.
- May I make my point?- [Bryan] Yeah. Yeah.
- So you wouldn't eatsix, like just, you know,
side of the road shrimps.
But when they've been taking...
- Shrimp, okay, so Iwouldn't eat six shrimp
(07:34):
found on the side of the road.
That's true. Yes.
- Just like, you wouldn'teat six string cheeses,
but you would eat a plate ofmozzarella sticks probably.
I wouldn't eat six sort of like loose
side of the road shrimps.
But it's in a shrimp cocktail form.
If it's been poached, if it's been loved,
(07:54):
if it's been properly lemon,
if the horse radish is comingthrough in the cocktail sauce,
that is paradise to me.
- Great.- What do you think about
solo shrimp cocktail eating, Jonathan?
- I am not generally a fan.Like, I have done it before.
I think, again, I thinkthat I'm going to go back
(08:15):
to the environment thing.
I actually had a soloshrimp cocktail yesterday
in Whole Foods by myself.
- Which Whole Foods?- The one in Hudson Yards.
And it was kind of like, youknow, it's sort of like, again,
the environment thing reallyadds into sort of like
how I feel about a shrimpcocktail at any given time.
(08:36):
And this like really,
eating it in the WholeFoods and Hudson Yards
made me depressed in likea almost existential way.
Like it was bad.
- But can I ask you, is thereany food that you would eat
in that Whole Foods, in the Hudson Yards,
specifically Hudson Yard Whole Foods
that would make you feel not depressed?
- That's a good question.- [Hannah] Thank you.
- And I think that like, there are foods
(08:59):
that are inherently happier,you know, like, I don't know.
If I ate an ice cream conethere, I might be happy,
- Yeah.
- You'd be fired on thespot from the Infatuation.
We came down and saw you in Whole Foods
eating an ice creamcone instead of working.
Kick you to the curb.
- Where's Jonathan? He'sbeen gone for 45 minutes.
- Yeah, I saw Jonathaneating an ice cream cone
at Whole Foods.
He looked really happy.
(09:19):
- Get rid of him.- Yeah.
How does shrimp cocktail make you feel
just in general when you're eating it?
- [Hannah] Yeah,- I think it makes me feel
similar to if I eat like,you know, some smoked salmon
or something like that.
It's like, it feels likeit is just kind of like
this pure protein where Ifeel a little bit like a bear
in a river or something.
And I'm just kind of like, you know,
(09:40):
there's not a whole lot like, you know,
that not a whole lot ofplaces that it can hide under.
You know, or like things that you can
kind of like distract from just like,
this is a pure shrimp that you're eating.
- I agree.
There's something about shrimp that
unlike an oyster or a mussel or a clam
because it has that translucent shell,
like the casing shrimpin the wild pretty much
(10:02):
looks like the shrimp we eat.
Like maybe there's a littlemore curvature when you cook it,
but like an oyster, you don't know
what's going on under there.
Like yesterday, Bryan and I went to Penny
and had, in the East Village on like ninth
or something between third and fourth.
- [Bryan] I want to go10th, I want to go 10th.
- 10th?
It's a seafood restaurantthat is mostly raw bar,
(10:24):
but they also have some hot stuff's.
Beautiful long room.
And they have what I believe is the best
shrimp cocktail I've evereaten, period, in my whole life.
And it did not disappoint.
It's been called by Bryan
and co at the Infatuation, NYC
as the best shrimp cocktail in New York.
And I usually am skeptical
(10:46):
and I like to be an independent thinker,
so I was worried it would let me down
and it so didn't, it was so beautiful.
Last night at 3:00 AM Iwas like thinking about,
you know, Penny's shrimp cocktail
and I wrote down that I wanted to be,
years from now I want to getold with Penny's shrimp cocktail
(11:08):
so I can ask it about its upbringing.
- Okay. What do you think it would say?
- I think it would sayI was poached gently.
I think it would say Iwas caught in Argentina.
I don't actually knowwhere the shrimp is from.
Do you know where the shrimp is from?
- It is Argentinian rich shrimp.
I do not know if it isin fact from Argentina.
I would also like to pointout, it is not poached.
(11:29):
We'll get into that later though.
- Oh my God.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- But the other thingthat we had at Penny,
we had these confit oysters.
So they're taken out of the shell
and then cooked in fat, essentially oil.
And they're warm.
So it's really like eating a warm booger.
- Yes, you've called them boogery
several times while we're eating them.
(11:51):
- And I just think anoyster, this oyster shell is,
there's mystery there.
And then when you, youdon't like the way it act,
it's when you see toomuch, it's kind of yucky.
Like keep your privateparts to yourself oyster.
- Sure, sure, sure, sure.
- But shrimp, it's like,that's a beautiful,
gorgeous body in that shrimp.
And we know exactly what it looks like.
(12:13):
- I would just say one other thing
that I love about a reallygood shrimp cocktail
is when the tail feels like it's been
like greased or something
and it comes off just like so easily.
- Yeah, low effort.
- Yeah.
Every now and then you get one
and it just like, kind of like breaks off
some of the meat in there
and it's like, it kind oflike ruins the whole thing.
You need some grease in there.
- You are a southern boy, yes?
(12:34):
- [Jonathan] I am. Yes.- Where are you from?
- I'm from North Carolina.- Okay.
So I associate southern eatingculture with like prawns
and crawfish and also just like maybe eat
in the whole shell.
Like do you, when you eat shrimp cocktail,
are you ever eating the tail?
- No. I'm not an animal.
(12:54):
- Hannah ate a tail last night.
- I did eat the tail last night
because I didn't wantit to be over at Penny.
It was so incredible.
- Oh, now they judged you for sure.
- No way judge you for not.- A hundred percent.
- [Hannah] Judge you for not.
- So Jonathan, when the tail slides off,
you would say that's a sign
of a really good shrimp cocktail.
What else do you else think
makes a perfect shrimp cocktail?
(13:16):
- I think that we already sortof touched on temperature,
but I do think that's ahugely important part of it.
I think it's nice tohave a little bit of a,
some garnish of some sort on there.
Like I think one shrimpcocktail that I had recently
that was excellent was at The View.
- What's The View?
- The View is a Danny Meyer restaurant.
(13:37):
I believe it's in the Marriott.
Marriott Times Square.
And it's sort of, it'sa rotating restaurant
and it goes 360 degrees.
You kind of like, depending on
how long you're going to besitting in the restaurant
for your dinner, you could see, you know,
all of Manhattan while
(13:57):
sort of like eating ashrimp cocktail very slowly.
- But not at puke speed.We're not moving too fast?
- It's moving very slowly.
I would say I was probablythere an hour and a half
and maybe made it threefourths of the way around.
- Oh nice.- Probably.
But they do a really nice thing
where they shave horseradish on top of the shrimp.
And the shrimp cocktail.
- But they're not pre saucing
(14:19):
with the cocktail sauceon the shrimp as well.
- Not pre saucing.- Okay.
So I, in my shrimp cocktailfield work have seen more
and more shaped horseradish right on the shrimp
at a place like Little Water in Philly.
They have shaped horseradish right on the shrimp.
And then they also havelike a house smoked ketchup.
(14:41):
Also in Philly, a placecalled Vernick Fish,
which is like the fanciestseafood restaurant you can go to.
They have these beautiful big shrimp
that cost $7 a piece, highway robbery.
And they are pre-addressed
with this like Gochujang cocktail sauce
and shaved horse radish.
And it's like very explosiveflavor and delicious.
But I'm not sure
(15:03):
pre saucing is always my favorite move.
- I think it could have delicious results.
I haven't tried it,
but what you described sounded good.
But it does take away from the aesthetic
of the shrimp cocktail,
which is I feel like is halfthe reason why you order it.
So Jonathan, you said The View
was one of your top shrimp cocktails?
- Yes.- Would you care to know
a little more about theshrimp cocktail at The View?
I actually have some inside information.
(15:24):
- [Hannah] Oh my God.- Please. Wow.
- He was like, man.- So that The View,
they use black tiger prawns from Vietnam.
- Oh.- "The prawns are poached
in a court bouillon of grapefruit chili
and salt in their shell.
Following their peeled
and deveined after being cookedto keep the flavor and snap.
Finally they're placed on pebble ice
(15:45):
and topped with fresh shaved horseradish.
Four to a cocktail, a total of $28."
- Did you taste any ofthat chili or grapefruit
or is it just, it's too subtle probably?
- I don't remember tasting it.
I think maybe if I went back
and I knew that thosewere the kind of notes
I was looking for, I would get it.
But yeah, I don't remembertasting grapefruit.
- Well I think court bouillonis definitely a common
(16:09):
factor of cooking shrimp cocktail.
- Most definitely.
It's the standard whenit comes to cooking.
But should it be?- I don't know.
The other thing that I have a gripe with
in terms of shrimp cocktail
and I don't have that many gripes.
This is probably the only one.
Jonathan, when you're at a restaurant
and you see shrimp cocktail,
what section on the menuis it usually listed under?
(16:29):
- Isn't that under apps first course?
- Raw bar.
- Raw bar. It's under the raw bar section.
- It's under the raw bar.
And that's not right
because shrimp cocktail is in fact cooked.
- It's cooked.- Doesn't that make you mad?
- Do you think a lot ofpeople think it's raw?
- People think it's raw.
And so I think people were like,
I don't like sushi, Idon't like raw stuff.
They don't need to order shrimp cocktail
(16:50):
and they're missing out.
That's a cooked food.- Interesting. Yeah.
- You guys, I have to say you have not
touched your shrimp cocktail.
- I would absolutely love some.
- Should we have a shrimp cocktail break?
- Yes.- Yeah.
- Oh my God, look at him.
There were seven shrimpin the shrimp cocktail
and we are three people.
Boom!- [Jonathan] Wow.
- Well that was a one biter Bryan.
And you like sucked itout. That was crazy.
(17:12):
- That came off prettyclean too, that tail.
- It's firm. A little snappy.
I would say, it's oddly salty to me.
Maybe a little saltier than I would like.
And it has an oceanic flavor
that maybe is not totally welcome.
- So you hate it.
- I would say it's not myfavorite shrimp cocktail.
(17:32):
- I like those. I like oceanic.
- Jonathan's thoughtson the shrimp cocktail?
- I think I would've likedmore cocktail sauce on there.
I think that's...- I'm sorry
that of cocktail sauceis not enough for you?
- I mean, on my specific shrimp
I would've dunked all the waydown to the tail maybe almost.
You know, like if I were here alone.
- Does size matter toyou in terms of shrimp?
(17:53):
Do you want a U 10?
Which for listeners at home
who are not constantlythinking about shrimp,
cocktail means that perpound you're getting
under 10 shrimp.
So they're big.
- I mean, I think similarly to oysters,
I think like I don't want 'em too small
and I don't want 'em too big, you know?
- Okay. A goldilock situation.
- Goldilock situation.
(18:15):
I would say that thesethat we're having right now
are kind of ideal.
I wouldn't want 'em muchbigger than that. I would say.
- This seems like classic
sort of like cartoonrendering shrimp size.
- Yeah.- Yeah,
these are pretty ideal.
- One other thing that I just,
talking about the seven shrimp on here,
there's three of us I think like maybe
this is something we get into,
but the odd number ofshrimp that is often served
in a shrimp cocktail.
Because I kind of agree with you, Bryan,
(18:36):
it's like something that youlike to share with people.
It's something that likeyou can eat it on your own,
but it's nice to have,
and I think it should be a law
that every restaurant says on the menu
how many shrimp you getin a shrimp cocktail.
So it's not a surprise you'reeating with someone else
and then five shrimp comes out
and next thing you knowyou're divorced, you know?
- I actually kind of likeit as a way to, you know,
(18:57):
separate the boys fromthe men, so to speak.
- Expand on this.
Like, if I'm eating with Bryan,
I'm going to be like, "Can I have that?"
And he's going to be like, "Youshould, that's your shrimp.
You should take thatshrimp." So I'm a man.
- I'm a boy.- [Hannah] Yes.
- Am I a good boy?- You're a good boy.
- Great.
- Jonathan, you said thatsetting really matters
(19:18):
when you're eating shrimp cocktail.
Does shrimp cocktail automaticallymake you feel fancier
or is it only whenyou're in a fancy place?
- I think shrimp cocktail
can kind of like reallyjust make whatever situation
you're in feel moreintense in a lot of ways.
I think if you're eatingit in a nice restaurant,
you're going to feel even fancier.
(19:38):
But if you're eating it in a dirty bar,
which sometimes they will serve
shrimp cocktails or something,
you're going to feel worse about yourself.
- Right.- 'Cause you're eating it.
- It doesn't make you feelfancier at a dive bar.
You roll up to the dive bar,you order the shrimp cocktail
and no one's like, Hey, youthink you're better than me?
I don't know why that's what people
in the dive bar sound like.
That's probably offensive.
- Yeah, brings you further down I think.
(19:58):
- Yeah. It's a high low food.
It can be your sort of like dingy.
It place's been around for decades,
shrimp cocktail order.
Or it can be served atthe finest of steakhouse.
Bryan and I had a really sortof, I'm going to go ahead
and say like run of themill shrimp cocktail
at a place called Tracks.
(20:19):
Which is near Penn Station and MSG
and Moynihan Train Hall.
- It made me feel fancy.- It did make me feel fancy.
It's was cooked with like true excellence.
Like it was had thelittle flop that you want,
but still firm enough.
It smelled, yeah, like the ocean floor.
But it smelled like my boyfriend's shoes
(20:41):
after he works a longservice in the kitchen.
- And this is like at a sports bar
in the shadow of Penn Station.
We're one of 10 people there,
but the place easily seats a hundred.
- It used to be underground.And then they moved.
It has the vibe of a placethat was formerly underground.
It looks like a diner.
It behaves like a dive bar.
(21:05):
Like Bryan got Guinness
and I got some, I don'tknow, some silly pilsner
or something.
And it's actually a rawbar. It's a lovely place.
- Wow.- I think we should go
have drinks there after this.
- But yeah, it did make you feel fancy
at that very un-fancy place.- [Hannah] Yeah.
- I'm pretty sure Hannahoffended the server too.
Hannah, what did you say?
You said, "Wow, thisis surprisingly good."
(21:27):
- I didn't say it like that.
- And then the bartender waslike, "Why is that surprising?
We're a raw bar."
- And then Bryan had to make me backpedal
and I was like, wow, you know,
some people are shrimp cocktail people
and some people aren't.
And so it's a really divisive thing.
- And now we're banned from Tracks.
- [Speaker] Shout out to Tracks
who provided this shrimp cocktail.
(21:47):
- No way. Okay.
Shout out to Tracks who provided...
- Shout out to Tracks.
- This incredible shrimp cocktail
that you just besmirched.
You, oh, it's a little salty.
- I was wrong.- It's interesting.
It plays into your point, Jonathan,
about setting like we are not in Tracks.
- We're not in Tracks.
This is actually how itlooked at Tracks though.
(22:07):
That's exactly how muchcocktail sauce we had
- Tracks fills up their martini glasses
to the brim with cocktail sauce.
- But they randomly stuff afew pieces of lettuce inside.
- I dunno why.- Shiso, they're shiso leaves.
- Oh shiso?- Yeah.
- So fancy.- Yeah.
- Is it in a clear glass like this?
- Yes it is.- Okay.
I mean I think that it doesmake a nice sort of tablescape,
it's nice to see in front of you
(22:29):
when you sit down at a table.
It also kind of makes you feel like
you're in Vegas in the 50s or something.
Which I think is always kindof a nice vibe for dinner.
- My understanding isthat shrimp cocktail,
the history of shrimp cocktailis very connected to Vegas.
That it was popularized inVegas in a casino in the 50s.
Which is maybe why youjust brought that up.
(22:50):
- That makes sense to me.- But my understanding is
that the origins of shrimp cocktail,
it started as oyster cocktail
because oysters were everywhere in,
I believe the 1800s.
Were going to have tofact check me on that.
- No, no, that sounds right.
- And then we overfished our oysters
and someone was like,uh-uh, what do we do?
And the reason it's called cocktail
(23:10):
is because they would take these oysters
and put it with cocktail sauce,
which was slightly different.
It was like more, it was like oyster share
and they would actuallydrink it with alcohol too.
And it was served as a drink in a glass,
which sounds like a dare now.
But that's why we call it shrimp cocktail.
- Yeah, that's still aroundactually oyster shooters,
you'll still see those kindof at bars and restaurants.
(23:30):
Yeah, kind of like Bloody Mary sauce
and alcohol in an oyster.- I mean, I'm down.
- Me too.
So I would say for me,
when it comes to orderingshrimp cocktail, first off,
99 out of a 100 times,
I will not order theshrimp cocktail on a menu.
- Why not?- Due to the price generally.
And also the fact that I don't think that
(23:50):
a lot of restaurants take shrimpcocktails seriously enough.
- Yeah. Yeah.
- You just need to poach some shrimp
and serve it with cocktail sauce
and boom, that shrimp cocktail.
The diners expectations just aren't there.
- What about at parties? Will you...
- At parties I will gobbledown shrimp cocktail.
- You'll gobble. Yeah.
It's funny, I asked a bunch of friends,
will you order shrimpcocktail at a restaurant
(24:12):
or is it just a party food to you?
And I think it was a pretty 50:50 split
about the restaurant ordersor the party gobblers.
And that to me is directly correlated
with how people feelabout sort of recklessly
spending money in restaurants.
You cannot be financially squeamish
and order shrimp cocktail.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- I don't even mean likeyou have to be rich.
(24:34):
You just have to be willingto spend money at restaurants.
And so it's like that alsokeeps prices also kind of high.
- Yeah, average price for shrimp cocktail
is probably around, what would you say?
Like $24?
- It depends where you are.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- It depends how new therestaurant is, I think also.
- I had one in Boston recently,this place called Pier 6.
(24:56):
- Oh, what were you doing in Boston?
- I was there for research
ahead of our ratings launch in Boston.
The Infatuation justlaunched ratings in Boston
a few weeks ago.
And this was all in preparation for that.
But Pier six, yeah, Iwould highly recommend
if you find yourself inBoston going to Pier 6,
(25:17):
it sort of juts out into the harbor.
It is an actual pier andyou can sit on the roof
and kind of just like, you know,
I think it was four shrimp
that they serve you at Pier 6, $28.
Same price as The View. AndI would say similar size.
- Yeah.- And it's a fantastic
shrimp cocktail with a goodamount of cocktail sauce
(25:40):
on the side.
Tails slip off easily.
- You love this tail slip?
- I think it's important.I think it's important.
- It's almost erotic theway you're talking about it.
I'm sorry you're my coworker,but it's like so intense.
- That's a very Hannah thing to say.
I'm sorry. I apologize.
- [Hannah] I'm still learninghow to talk to people.
- Yeah. Yeah.
(26:01):
- If you're looking forgreat seafood in your city,
check out our guides
and reviews on the Infatuation.com
or at Infatuation on Instagram
or at TheInfatuation on TikTok.
- Now we're going to play a game called
"How much does that shrimp cocktail cost?"
We're going to start with Dirty French,
which is a place for steaks in Miami.
(26:24):
And the menu description,simply "Shrimp Cocktail".
And our Infatuation reviewfrom editor Ryan Pfeffer says,
"This order includes six fairly large,
tasty shrimp sprinkled with chives.
It's served with a solidhouse cocktail sauce
and what's supposed to be spicy remoulade,
although it's not very spicy at all."
(26:44):
What do you guys think?
- Wow. Guess how much thatshrimp cocktail costs?
Crucially, you got tokeep in mind Dirty French
is a major food group restaurant.
So a sister restaurantof carbon. Not cheap.
- [Hannah] Yep.- Jonathan, you have any
initial thoughts here?
- I would say $32.
- I was leaning $32 as well.
Maybe it's steep though. I don't know.
- I'm going $28.- $28. Yeah.
- Alright. What is it, Hannah?
(27:05):
- $33.- Ooh!
- I way off.
- That's a steep cocktail. That's steep.
- Because are so muchbetter than me at this.
- Yeah, we're better thanyou at a lot of stuff.
- Yeah, that's true.- Okay, let's,
we'll do HMS BOUNTY.
So this is from HMS BOUNTY in LA
and the Infatuation review here.
(27:25):
It's written by Brant Cox
and our editor in chief Arden Shore.
"The straightforward version here,
four shrimp classic cocktail sauce,
and two packets ofsaltines, isn't only good
because of the settingor the shot in beer combo
you just knocked back.
It's good because of theshrimp are plump, chilled
and delicious."
- Shot beer combos.
(27:46):
- Yeah. That to me implies cheaper.
- Keep in mind, four shrimp. Four shrimp.
- Fancy place of servedfor shrimp cocktail
- $15.75.
- I think it's going to be, Ithink we're going like $20, $24.
- I'm going to say $19.95.- I like that.
- I love the 95.
(28:07):
- So the shrimp cocktailat HMS BOUNTY in LA
will set you back $11 and 99 cents.
- Oh, hotdog. Let's go.
- Let's go there.- Let's go. That's fun.
- That is a good deal.- Okay HMS BOUNTY.
Okay, LA.
The next one is BLVD STEAK,
which is a steakhouse in LA.
The menu description says
(28:28):
"Jumbo shrimp cocktail, mustard aioli
and cocktail sauce."
From our guide to the bestshrimp cocktail in Los Angeles,
which was penned by BrantCox and Arden Shore.
They say. "Dry ice smokeshould normally be reserved
for haunted houses and arena rock shows.
But at BLVD STEAK,
(28:48):
a splashy modern steakhousein Sherman Oaks, it's a fun
and slightly silly way to make a dish
that always looks more orless the same stand out."
It's going to be pricey.
- I don't want dry ice on my shrimp.
- No, that seems like hazardous.
- Yeah.
- Oof. The place is described as splashy.
- Are we sure it's pronouncedBLVD STEAK too? It says BLVD.
(29:09):
- Right.
- You're paying for that abbreviation.
- So what are you guessing?
- I'm going with $36.- $36?
- I'm sorry, I got to do something.
I've been losing you, okay?
- [Hannah] You got to go bold.
- I do think this one's going to be
on the pricier side of thing.
I'm going to say $30 for this one.
(29:29):
- Okay. I think thisis a per shrimp price.
I think we're going, it's $5 per shrimp.
- Oh, okay.
- And you can order as many as you want.
- What did you say again?- I said $30.
Why didn't you ask me what I said?
- $34 is the winner.
- So Bryan, you got it.One point for Bryan.
(29:51):
- Alright.
Next up we have Sweetings in London.
The menu description, "Prawn Cocktail",
because that's what they callshrimp cocktail over there.
- Yeah, wait, we need to aminute to explain the difference
between prawn cocktailand shrimp cocktail.
'Cause I was horrified to learn this.
It's basically a chopped up salad
of shrimp with somethingcalled Marie Rose sauce,
(30:14):
which is like tomato and mayo
and sort of like a thousand island
minus the pickle or relish.
And it's all like slapped into a bowl
and then like covered with sauce.
It's really gnarly looking. I have to say.
- Yeah, I've seen pictures of it.
- [Hannah] Yeah.- It sounds bad.
- It doesn't look goodto me, but I don't know.
I don't know.
(30:34):
- Our Infatuation review of Sweetings says
that their prawn cocktailis "Pyrex bowl, check.
Shredded iceberg lettuce, check.
A pile of prawns andMarie Rose sauce, check.
It looks and tastes as you'd expect."
Okay. So that's not...
- Which sounds like a bad thing.
- They don't seem to love it,
but it also sounds pretty standard, so.
(30:56):
I'm going with seven pounds.They use pounds, right?
- Yeah.- Yeah.
- But what's the conversion right now?
- I don't know. Just go with your gut.
- I think it's going to be,I mean, London's expensive
and they like weird stuff over there.
So I think maybe 14 pounds.
- I feel like, I'm going to say 12 pounds.
(31:18):
- Okay.- Okay.
You ready for the price?- Yeah.
- At Sweetings in Londonfor the prawn cocktail,
you are going to pay 12 pounds 50.
- Okay, I was close.
- I continue to be very bad at this game.
I think Jonathan's winning.
If you care for theconversion that is around $16.
- Oh my God.
Well that's, I mean, it'scheaper than what we're paying.
(31:40):
- But, it's a steal,- But it's a, you know,
chopped up shrimp in a Pyrex bowl.
- Yeah. Yeah.- Not worth it.
- Good job everyone. That was fun.
- Yeah, I won.- No.
- [Bryan] Yeah.- No, I think Jonathan won.
- Jonathan out shrimped us.
- You always out shrimp us.
- Where's your favorite shrimp cocktail?
Let us know in thecomments or shoot us a dm.
(32:03):
- So clearly there areshrimp cocktail versions
that cost 11 ish dollars at a, you know,
old school more bar like place.
And then there on the otherside you have your dry ice
shrimp cocktail for $36,
- $34. I think it was.- $34.
And so there's a prettysignificant range there.
(32:26):
What do you make of that?
I mean, do the factors of size
and setting, they seem toreally make a difference
in terms of price.
If you're eating the $34 shrimp cocktail,
it's so much better thanthe $11 shrimp cocktail.
- Yeah, I guess it really depends on
the technique that's used
(32:46):
and then the presentationI guess to an extent.
But it's more about you'repaying for setting as well.
But, so setting, technique, presentation,
and then the shrimp itself,
I think that could make ashrimp cocktail cost that much.
The question is, would youpay $34 for a shrimp cocktail?
It could be better thanthe $11 shrimp cocktail
for a range of factors.
(33:07):
You have to consider all of it.
And I think that's what wedo with the Infatuation.
We consider all of thefactors, the presentation,
the setting, the shrimp itself.
And then the techniquethat's applied to the shrimp.
So all of that just goesinto the experience.
It's not just the shrimpthat you're eating.
It's everything. So would we pay more?
Would I pay more for a dry icepresentation? Probably not.
(33:28):
But the writers in LA speakhighly of it and I trust them.
So maybe it is just a good fun time.
Would you pay $34 for any shrimp cocktail?
- No, I would not.
I think all shrimpcocktails should cost $18.
- Ooh, I love that.- I think that's like
the sort of like a good baseline.
And you can have that on a menu
(33:50):
and you know, as a serveryou could tell someone
about it with a straight face.
You're trying to, $34 shrimp cocktail
is I think ridiculous, you know?
- That's a huge shrimp cocktail.
- Anything cheaper thanthat is like you're really
questioning like wherethat shrimp's coming from
and if it's actually any good
or just going to make you sick.
$18.
- $18 is good for a restaurant.
I mean, to me, now that I'vehad Penny's shrimp cocktail
(34:10):
and it costs $24, which Ithink is a reasonable price
for what we know to be a dishthat requires, you know, labor
and thought and ingredients like, sure.
Not to, you know, soundlike a broken shrimp record.
I went to Penny, Penny's shrimpcocktail. We had a Penny.
Penny. You should go to Penny.
But the Penny texture was my ideal
(34:33):
because it almost had the like creamy
floppy thing that likewhen you go to have sushi
and you have the raw eby, the shrimp.
It has that texture,
it has that sweetness,but it's cooked shrimp.
I actually don't know howthey get it like that.
- [Bryan] Yeah.- And I'd love to know.
- How do they get that?
(34:53):
Well, I talked to, tell me now the chef
Joshua Pinsky of Penny.
First off Joshua says,we used gold shrimp,
tiger shrimp, blue shrimp,
pretty much every shrimp,seafood purveyors had
that is on the R&D process.
He went through all those kinds of shrimp.
And eventually landed onthe Argentinian red shrimp.
(35:14):
I'm very familiar withArgentinian red shrimp, he says,
and I wanted to try to findsomething a little more local,
but quality wise in terms of texture
and flavor, they beat everything else out.
Now in terms of preparation,
how to get to that perfect texture?
Here it is.
So Joshua says, "Whenyou cook shrimp cocktail,
you're poaching them in a potof flavored hot water, right?
(35:35):
And then you tend to take them out
and cool them in ice waterso they stopped cooking.
Well, if you boil the shrimp
and put them in ice water,
you're just rinsing off the flavor."
So Joshua says, "Instead of cooking it
in a seasoned court bouillon,
we just steam the shrimp."
Steaming seems key.- Whoa!
- Joshua says, "When we'resteaming it, there's no flavor.
(35:58):
That's why we cure them first."
The cure is essentially just salt
and baking soda, Ibelieve is what he said.
The baking soda is to retainthe plumpness of the shrimp.
And that I think is a common trick.
- He's a mad scientist.
- But that the real trick is that he says,
'After it's steamed, thenwe cool it salted fish sauce
(36:18):
water essentially."
Yeah, there's other stuff in there.
But he calls it salted fish sauce water,
essentially to make sure they have umami.
- Oh my God.- Is the trick.
That and the variety that they chose
after going through somany different types,
they landed on Argentinian red shrimp.
- Well, when we publish ourshrimp cocktail cookbook,
we can include that.
They make their owncocktail sauce, I assume.
Not with ketchup, but like with tomatoes.
(36:39):
- So it is with ketchup.
- They pretty much doketchup times ketchup.
It's double ketchup.
They use ketchup
and then they make theirown ketchup pretty much.
And add it to that.- Wow.
- Yeah, so like tomatopastes, vinegar, horse radish,
and then horse radish oil as well.
Which I think it gives it a nice kick.
That horse radish oil.
- If you've gotten thisfar in this episode
(37:00):
about shrimp cocktail,you should go to Penny
and to experience theheight of shrimp cocktail.
- Absolutely, go to Penny.
Chef Joshua Pinsky takes hisshrimp cocktail very seriously.
- But the thing that chefsdon't want you to know
is that shrimp is cheap as hell.
- How cheap we talking?- I'll tell you,
I was snooping around.
(37:22):
I was asking some chefs, "Hey,you serve shrimp cocktail.
How much you paying for shrimp?"
People did not want totell me on the record.
And I asked some people anonymously
what these restaurant ownerswere paying for their shrimp.
And I got some answers.
- All right, let's hear it.- So restaurants usually order
(37:43):
their shrimp by the case, which is not,
you know, like you or me.
That would be extraordinary.
And a case is usually like40 ish pounds of shrimp.
So I heard from someone who is a line cook
and they will remain anonymous.
They said that they weregetting Louisiana prawns
(38:03):
for around $600 for 40ish pounds of shrimp.
So just for an exercise,
let's so say those prawns are like U 12,
so they're like 12 prawns per pound.
That's 480 prawns in 40 pounds.
Which if you do the math isabout a dollar 25 per prawn.
(38:25):
And I was like, huh, maybethat's a just one off example.
I'll give you another example.
So this is like shrimpthat's like white all natural
from this brand calledOishi, which is great.
They sell it in the grocerystore. You can get it frozen.
Good to have in your freezer.
That costs a restaurant who I won't name
(38:47):
$11.99 per pound.
So they're getting about 14or fewer shrimp per pound.
So it's going to costthe restaurant like $12
for 14 shrimp.
And each shrimp is a little over a dollar.
So if you are paying $34for your shrimp cocktail,
just know that that shrimp cannot possibly
(39:09):
cost more than a couple dollars.
How does that make youfeel? Does it anger you?
- I feel, I mean, I don't know.
I would need to talk to some NYC folks
and like get the numbers here.
Maybe it's different.It doesn't feel great.
I feel a little betrayed.
- Yeah.- But at the same time,
I wasn't really orderingshrimp cocktail to begin with.
(39:29):
- Shrimp cocktail'sobjectively a silly order.
So it is there another silly order
that you are really into thatperhaps shrimp, you know,
people who don't get shrimp cocktail,
but they want a sillylittle order could try?
- I have a very silly order Ican tell you about right now,
but it is shrimp cocktail.- What?
- We can get into this later, so...
- No, come on, let's hear it.
(39:49):
- Well, recently at Cafe Chelsea,
I ordered a shrimp cocktail entree.
Do you know what that is?
- No.- No.
It's when you order two shrimpcocktails as your entree.
- Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I'm sorry.
Your even sillier order
is you'll get two ordersof shrimp cocktail.
- That's not an orderI'm really going to do.
I might do it for the bit going forward.
(40:11):
- It's really funny.
- I think that's purely for research.
- Yeah, that was really good.- To see if shrimp cocktail
could be an entree.
- Did it fill you up enough?
- It did. In a gross kind of way.
- Yeah. That doesn't, itdoesn't sound amazing.
It sounds like maybe too much.
- I asked the bartender ifpeople did it a lot or ever
and the bartender was like, no judgment.
They were just like, you know,
people do all sorts of things, man and...
(40:32):
- We've seen it all.
- Yeah, and then so they brought me
two shrimp cocktails side by side.
I have a picture, I can show it to you.
And then a side of fries,which was necessary.
- You should asked them to course it out.
- No, no, no. I didn't want.
I wanted the whole thing just right there.
- I know. But just imagine.
- So you could see what I was doing
and be disgusted.
By the eighth shrimp, I started to feel
a little disgusted shrimp.
They were a little too cold.
(40:52):
You don't want such a cold clammy dinner.
- The shrimp started to feel cadaverous.
That is the exact right word.
- It's a really good word.
- Maybe that's why it's thestart of the meal thing.
You just want a little,
a little cold cadaver to get you going.
(41:13):
- One cadaver's, okay.
By the time you get tothe eighth, it's too...
- Also not to mention gout.
That's a gout flare up maybe.
- So anyways.- So Jonathan
as our shrimp cocktail extraordinaire.
Shrimp cocktail expert,shrimp cocktail hero,
shrimp cocktail puritan.
- Yeah. Puritan?
(41:34):
I don't know if that's the right word.
- Shrimp cocktail.- Obsessive.
- Obsessive- Connoisseur.
- Where do you see shrimp cocktail
in terms of the future?
Are we still going to beordering shrimp cocktail?
What's your guess into the future here?
- I think that it is going to continue
to get prohibitively more expensive.
I think you know, it won't be long
(41:55):
before we're seeing a $50 shrimp cocktail,
I think, you know?
I also think it's sort of like,
along with that it'sreally primed, you know,
as you all might have heard,
they're putting proteinin everything these days
and figuring out the best way
to sort of fit that in askind of cleanly as possible.
And I think shrimp is agood source of protein.
I think, like people are going to pay
(42:16):
to just have that clean protein.
- So you're saying shrimp cocktail,
like you know how like gym bros will get
a lot of like grilled chicken?
So you think shrimp cocktail
might turn into a gym, bro food?
- I think, I think it's possible.
- Unfortunately, I thinkJonathan's guess is so accurate.
Protein is so in right now.
And it could either,
shrimp cocktails could take on new forms
(42:38):
such as the shrimp protein bar.
I could definitely seethat becoming a thing.
- I was thinking about thisfuture of shrimp cocktail
and you know, we canguess as much as we want,
but why not turn to theexperts on the subject.
- Who are the experts?- I did pay $30
(43:00):
to a psychic on Etsy.- Oh!
- $30 seems too cheap.
- Oh, like she should raise her rates?
The future of shrimp cocktail,
according to our Etsy psychic,
this is a worldwide forecast.
"Shrimp cocktail is notfading. It's being reborn.
Here comes fusion, shrimpcocktail will start borrowing
(43:22):
from international cultures.
Picture wasabi ponzu cocktailsin Japanese fusion spots.
Spicy tamarind sauces inLatin inspired eateries
or shrimp served with yogurt dips.
Shrimp cocktail will be re-imagined
as a gourmet small platerather than just an appetizer."
- The psychic sounds like Chat GPT,
- It's Chat GPT
(43:43):
and also just like akind of trend forecaster
more than a psychic.
- But guys, I also asked,
the first part of the question was,
what is my future of shrimpcocktail, like, personally,
what's my future of shrimp cocktail?
And they said,
"You and shrimp cocktailhave a karmic tie.
Shrimp cocktail for youwon't just be a dish,
it'll be a comfort anchor.
(44:03):
When things feel uncertain oryou need something familiar
and grounding the cooltexture, bright lemon
and sharp tank of cocktail sauce
will feel like a reset button."
- Hannah is definitely way more karmically
connected to shrimp cocktail than I am.
Observe the bright orange top,
Hannah is shrimp cocktail.- Don't talk about my top.
Will we all eat shrimpcocktail in the future?
(44:25):
- I'm still going toorder shrimp cocktail,
but like once a year,once every two years,
which is about howoften I order it anyway.
It was never about, it'snever about the money.
I mean that's the reasonwhy I don't order it.
But I never thought that shrimp cocktail
was a good use of money anyway.
- Yeah, I mean I do thinkthat shrimp cocktail
is a little too expensive.
(44:45):
But I think, you know, to kind of go back
to what we were saying earlier,
I think part of the reasonthat you're ordering
shrimp cocktail is not forthe value that you're getting.
It's like you want thatthing on your table.
It is something of like a,
it's a celebration in a glass, you know?
And I think that's why you do it.
And we're okay with paying
a premium for that sometimes, you know?
- I totally agree.
(45:05):
I'm going to continue toorder shrimp cocktail.
Shrimp is cheap, but it's delicious.
And shrimp cocktail is delicious.
And also I think, you know,
shrimp cocktail is a moneymaker hopefully for a reason.
Maybe that means on a menua chef is able to have
a dish that's a little lesscost-effective moneymaking
because they are raking in the dough
(45:27):
with their shrimp cocktail.
So the shrimp cocktaileaters are subsidizing
everybody else.
- Yes.- [Bryan] Wow.
- Yeah, so when you order shrimp cocktail,
just know you're doing asolid to everyone else.
- You're paying for somebody else's meal.
- [Hannah] Yeah.- Everyone should thank
their friendly shrimp cocktail eater.
- Jonathan, thank youso much for joining us
and talking about your shrimppreferences on the pod.
Hope you had a great time.
(45:48):
- Did you have a good time?- I had a fantastic time.
- What else did you?- A shrimp tastic.
- Oh God. Well, yougot to get out of here.
If you loved this episode,
if you were obsessed with this episode,
if you were religiouslychanged by this episode,
make sure to like, follow
and subscribe to RestaurantPeople on YouTube
or any of your preferredpodcast platforms.
(46:10):
I'm Hannah.
- I'm Bryan.
- Thanks for joining uson Restaurant People.
A show from Infatuation.
- Hannah, we have had alot of shrimp cocktail
over the past, I want to say two weeks.
- Yeah.- Just last night
we went to two restaurants,had two shrimp cocktails.
Spent a total of around probably 50, $60
on a total of nine cocktail shrimp.
- Bryan, I think we got to talk about
why we're paying for shrimp cocktail
and why I will continue topay for it till the day I die.
(00:22):
- Absolutely.
I think today we are going
to do an exhaustiveinvestigation on why people
are ordering shrimp cocktail.
Who's ordering shrimp cocktail?
- Everyone.- And why shrimp cocktail?
Just broadly, why?
- Yeah. Why?- It's luxurious.
It's not as expensive as caviar.
Maybe that's it. Maybe that's the appeal.
- Is shrimp cocktailthe poor man's caviar?
(00:44):
- Well, it's definitelynot for poor people
'cause it's so expensive.
- You're right about that.
Hey, you shrimp lovers.
This is Infatuations Restaurant People.
The show for people who eatat restaurants sometimes.
- I'm Hannah Albertine,senior editor at Infatuation
and woman who is dressed like a shrimp.
- I'm Brian Kim, editoriallead at Infatuation NYC.
(01:06):
And I think shrimp tastesbetter than they smell.
Today on Restaurant People,
we're talking about shrimp cocktail.
The appetizer is everywhere,but should it be anywhere?
- Is ordering shrimp cocktail a good idea?
Financially, emotionally?We're going to talk about it.
- On today's episode,we'll be joined in studio
by guest Jonathan Smith,Infatuation editor
and shrimp cocktailenthusiast to eat some shrimp
(01:27):
and talk about what about shrimp cocktail
gets us every single time.
- And we'll also talk aboutour favorite shrimp cocktails
and where you can find them.
- All this and more on today'sepisode of Restaurant People.
Hannah, are you ready to get shrimpy?
- I'm so ready.- Me too
- Restaurant People,
we have a very special guest this episode,
(01:49):
senior editor, shrimpcocktail watchdog, your friend
and mine, welcome Jonathan.
- Thank you. Thanks for having me.
- We're so excited you're here.
I can't believe your family of shrimps
let you come on this podcast.
- I know, it's wild.
I was able to escape the net and I'm here.
- Aw.- Jonathan Raised by shrimp
in the Gulf of Mexico.
Jonathan, you see what's in front of us?
(02:11):
- It's a shrimp cocktail.
- It's called shrimp cocktail actually.
Why is it there?
Because this whole episode
is going to be about shrimp cocktail.
Everybody just take thetime to say the word shrimp.
Jonathan, can I get a shrimp?
- Shrimp.
- Shrimp. Shrimp.
- Shrimp.- Ooh.
- Now what do you have to tell us about
shrimp cocktail Jonathan?
(02:32):
- I have spent a lot of timethinking about shrimp cocktail
over the years, and Ithink there are a few foods
that kind of fall into the same category,
but shrimp cocktail is verydependent on your environment.
I think.
You know, I feel likeyou can have the exact
same shrimp cocktailin two different places
and it can be eitherhorrible or mind blowing.
(02:54):
- Do you think that's right, Bryan?
- Yeah. Okay, I'll buy that for now.
- Yeah, I'm in.- Yeah.
- Yeah.
Well, I mean, thisenvironment is pretty similar
to where we normally eatshrimp cocktail, right?
With cameras.
- We eat shrimp cocktail inall kinds of environments.
Hannah and I have at shrimp cocktail
at least three times this week.
- Wow!- [Hannah] True. Yeah.
- Wow.
(03:14):
- We've shrimped in highplaces and low ones.
And now we're going to shrimp with you.
I mean, it's only fair,
like we had to offeryou some shrimp cocktail
on the shrimp cocktail episode.
- It looks delicious.
- We are looking at a martini glass
full of cocktail sauce
with seven beautifulcurled shrimps coming out.
(03:36):
Sort of like water fallingout of the top of the glass.
And there's a nice lemon wedgethat is placed on the rim.
And actually, Bryan,
I want to quote something you said
in our earlier martini episode.
- Yes, please.- Which was,
"Anything that comes in amartini glass is a martini."
- I did say that.- So are we looking
at a martini right now?- This is a shrimp-tini.
(03:58):
This is a shrimp martini.
- Don't mind if I do.
Tell me, Jonathan, is this presentation,
the glass full of cocktail sauce,
is that something you've seen personally
in your shrimp cocktail research?
- I haven't seen it ina clear cocktail glass
in quite a while.- [Hannah] Okay.
- I had a shrimp cocktail at Randazzo's
(04:20):
in Sheepshed Bay about a week ago.
That was in a kind of likemetal coop that was like,
you know, sort of cocktail shaped.
But not clear.
And I think this is a classy
presentation that we have right here.
- It's really good.
- Yeah, having had shrimp cocktail,
I would say probably sixtimes in the past two weeks.
It's generally how you described it
in a metal container with ice.
(04:42):
The shrimp is on the ice, andthen you have a lemon wedge,
and then you have cocktailsauce on the side.
This I think is more ofan old school presentation
and the martini emitting the ice.
Either way, a legitimate shrimp cocktail,
all the important elements are there.
Sauce, shrimp, lemon.
- And you know what,notably it is still cold,
which is an essentialpart of a shrimp cocktail.
Like if you're eating anyshrimp that feels even tepid,
(05:06):
you don't want it.
That is not a good shrimp cocktail.
It's a recipe for disaster.
- Cold, but not too cold.Am I right Jonathan?
- I, it would be hard for me.
I mean, frozen, you don't want.
But I think like, youknow, anything below that
is good with me.
- You want ice?- I would like ice.
- Yeah.
Because it's like, oh myGod, it's this precious
little dainty, adorable foodthat needs to be chilled.
(05:27):
Or is it like ice is kindof a luxurious thing?
Or is it like sensitiveto health concerns?
- I think it's maybe a littlebit of all of those things.
It's a dish that's meant to be eaten
and encourage you to eat it faster.
You don't want to wait forthe ice to melt, you know,
then you got like water on your table.
It's like you got to justlike keep eating it, you know?
- I've seen pebble ice lately.
(05:48):
Seems to be the shrimp cocktailcontemporary choice for ice.
I've seen crushed whereit's like almost the texture
of water ice, sorry.
Italian ice for non Philadelphians.
- I know what water iceis. Don't talk down to me.
Yeah, I think that pebble iceis definitely a better call.
It's going to melt slower.
It's not going to make your shrimp watery.
(06:09):
- I really wanted to do anepisode on shrimp cocktail
because I think it's a really silly food.
It's cold shrimp and it's ketchup
and I pay a lot of money to eat it.
And I know it's alwaysa bad financial decision
and I can't seem to stop.
- It's a very silly food.
It's a very 1950s dinnerparty food, I would say.
(06:32):
There's something inherentlyfunny just about shrimp.
- Look at them.
- Hannah and I have been obsessedwith shrimp for years now,
but she definitely likesshrimp cocktail more than I do.
- Why? What's your problem?- It's just like,
it seems like such areckless use of money.
And I can think of so many other ways.
I would rather eat shrimp.
That said, I do enjoy a shrimp cocktail.
I'm not sure I wantone entirely to myself.
(06:52):
I think it should be shared.
- I disagree. I'm so happy toeat shrimp cocktail by myself.
In fact, I enjoy, I relisha solo shrimp cocktail.
It's similar to when you'reeating mozzarella sticks.
Like you would never eatsix naked mozzarella sticks.
Like pull apart.
You'd eat six pull apart string cheese.
(07:14):
- Oh, I thought you said mozzarella...
- I'm making my point.
- May I make my point?- [Bryan] Yeah. Yeah.
- So you wouldn't eatsix, like just, you know,
side of the road shrimps.
But when they've been taking...
- Shrimp, okay, so Iwouldn't eat six shrimp
(07:34):
found on the side of the road.
That's true. Yes.
- Just like, you wouldn'teat six string cheeses,
but you would eat a plate ofmozzarella sticks probably.
I wouldn't eat six sort of like loose
side of the road shrimps.
But it's in a shrimp cocktail form.
If it's been poached, if it's been loved,
(07:54):
if it's been properly lemon,
if the horse radish is comingthrough in the cocktail sauce,
that is paradise to me.
- Great.- What do you think about
solo shrimp cocktail eating, Jonathan?
- I am not generally a fan.Like, I have done it before.
I think, again, I thinkthat I'm going to go back
(08:15):
to the environment thing.
I actually had a soloshrimp cocktail yesterday
in Whole Foods by myself.
- Which Whole Foods?- The one in Hudson Yards.
And it was kind of like, youknow, it's sort of like, again,
the environment thing reallyadds into sort of like
how I feel about a shrimpcocktail at any given time.
(08:36):
And this like really,
eating it in the WholeFoods and Hudson Yards
made me depressed in likea almost existential way.
Like it was bad.
- But can I ask you, is thereany food that you would eat
in that Whole Foods, in the Hudson Yards,
specifically Hudson Yard Whole Foods
that would make you feel not depressed?
- That's a good question.- [Hannah] Thank you.
- And I think that like, there are foods
(08:59):
that are inherently happier,you know, like, I don't know.
If I ate an ice cream conethere, I might be happy,
- Yeah.
- You'd be fired on thespot from the Infatuation.
We came down and saw you in Whole Foods
eating an ice creamcone instead of working.
Kick you to the curb.
- Where's Jonathan? He'sbeen gone for 45 minutes.
- Yeah, I saw Jonathaneating an ice cream cone
at Whole Foods.
He looked really happy.
(09:19):
- Get rid of him.- Yeah.
How does shrimp cocktail make you feel
just in general when you're eating it?
- [Hannah] Yeah,- I think it makes me feel
similar to if I eat like,you know, some smoked salmon
or something like that.
It's like, it feels likeit is just kind of like
this pure protein where Ifeel a little bit like a bear
in a river or something.
And I'm just kind of like, you know,
(09:40):
there's not a whole lot like, you know,
that not a whole lot ofplaces that it can hide under.
You know, or like things that you can
kind of like distract from just like,
this is a pure shrimp that you're eating.
- I agree.
There's something about shrimp that
unlike an oyster or a mussel or a clam
because it has that translucent shell,
like the casing shrimpin the wild pretty much
(10:02):
looks like the shrimp we eat.
Like maybe there's a littlemore curvature when you cook it,
but like an oyster, you don't know
what's going on under there.
Like yesterday, Bryan and I went to Penny
and had, in the East Village on like ninth
or something between third and fourth.
- [Bryan] I want to go10th, I want to go 10th.
- 10th?
It's a seafood restaurantthat is mostly raw bar,
(10:24):
but they also have some hot stuff's.
Beautiful long room.
And they have what I believe is the best
shrimp cocktail I've evereaten, period, in my whole life.
And it did not disappoint.
It's been called by Bryan
and co at the Infatuation, NYC
as the best shrimp cocktail in New York.
And I usually am skeptical
(10:46):
and I like to be an independent thinker,
so I was worried it would let me down
and it so didn't, it was so beautiful.
Last night at 3:00 AM Iwas like thinking about,
you know, Penny's shrimp cocktail
and I wrote down that I wanted to be,
years from now I want to getold with Penny's shrimp cocktail
(11:08):
so I can ask it about its upbringing.
- Okay. What do you think it would say?
- I think it would sayI was poached gently.
I think it would say Iwas caught in Argentina.
I don't actually knowwhere the shrimp is from.
Do you know where the shrimp is from?
- It is Argentinian rich shrimp.
I do not know if it isin fact from Argentina.
I would also like to pointout, it is not poached.
(11:29):
We'll get into that later though.
- Oh my God.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- But the other thingthat we had at Penny,
we had these confit oysters.
So they're taken out of the shell
and then cooked in fat, essentially oil.
And they're warm.
So it's really like eating a warm booger.
- Yes, you've called them boogery
several times while we're eating them.
(11:51):
- And I just think anoyster, this oyster shell is,
there's mystery there.
And then when you, youdon't like the way it act,
it's when you see toomuch, it's kind of yucky.
Like keep your privateparts to yourself oyster.
- Sure, sure, sure, sure.
- But shrimp, it's like,that's a beautiful,
gorgeous body in that shrimp.
And we know exactly what it looks like.
(12:13):
- I would just say one other thing
that I love about a reallygood shrimp cocktail
is when the tail feels like it's been
like greased or something
and it comes off just like so easily.
- Yeah, low effort.
- Yeah.
Every now and then you get one
and it just like, kind of like breaks off
some of the meat in there
and it's like, it kind oflike ruins the whole thing.
You need some grease in there.
- You are a southern boy, yes?
(12:34):
- [Jonathan] I am. Yes.- Where are you from?
- I'm from North Carolina.- Okay.
So I associate southern eatingculture with like prawns
and crawfish and also just like maybe eat
in the whole shell.
Like do you, when you eat shrimp cocktail,
are you ever eating the tail?
- No. I'm not an animal.
(12:54):
- Hannah ate a tail last night.
- I did eat the tail last night
because I didn't wantit to be over at Penny.
It was so incredible.
- Oh, now they judged you for sure.
- No way judge you for not.- A hundred percent.
- [Hannah] Judge you for not.
- So Jonathan, when the tail slides off,
you would say that's a sign
of a really good shrimp cocktail.
What else do you else think
makes a perfect shrimp cocktail?
(13:16):
- I think that we already sortof touched on temperature,
but I do think that's ahugely important part of it.
I think it's nice tohave a little bit of a,
some garnish of some sort on there.
Like I think one shrimpcocktail that I had recently
that was excellent was at The View.
- What's The View?
- The View is a Danny Meyer restaurant.
(13:37):
I believe it's in the Marriott.
Marriott Times Square.
And it's sort of, it'sa rotating restaurant
and it goes 360 degrees.
You kind of like, depending on
how long you're going to besitting in the restaurant
for your dinner, you could see, you know,
all of Manhattan while
(13:57):
sort of like eating ashrimp cocktail very slowly.
- But not at puke speed.We're not moving too fast?
- It's moving very slowly.
I would say I was probablythere an hour and a half
and maybe made it threefourths of the way around.
- Oh nice.- Probably.
But they do a really nice thing
where they shave horseradish on top of the shrimp.
And the shrimp cocktail.
- But they're not pre saucing
(14:19):
with the cocktail sauceon the shrimp as well.
- Not pre saucing.- Okay.
So I, in my shrimp cocktailfield work have seen more
and more shaped horseradish right on the shrimp
at a place like Little Water in Philly.
They have shaped horseradish right on the shrimp.
And then they also havelike a house smoked ketchup.
(14:41):
Also in Philly, a placecalled Vernick Fish,
which is like the fanciestseafood restaurant you can go to.
They have these beautiful big shrimp
that cost $7 a piece, highway robbery.
And they are pre-addressed
with this like Gochujang cocktail sauce
and shaved horse radish.
And it's like very explosiveflavor and delicious.
But I'm not sure
(15:03):
pre saucing is always my favorite move.
- I think it could have delicious results.
I haven't tried it,
but what you described sounded good.
But it does take away from the aesthetic
of the shrimp cocktail,
which is I feel like is halfthe reason why you order it.
So Jonathan, you said The View
was one of your top shrimp cocktails?
- Yes.- Would you care to know
a little more about theshrimp cocktail at The View?
I actually have some inside information.
(15:24):
- [Hannah] Oh my God.- Please. Wow.
- He was like, man.- So that The View,
they use black tiger prawns from Vietnam.
- Oh.- "The prawns are poached
in a court bouillon of grapefruit chili
and salt in their shell.
Following their peeled
and deveined after being cookedto keep the flavor and snap.
Finally they're placed on pebble ice
(15:45):
and topped with fresh shaved horseradish.
Four to a cocktail, a total of $28."
- Did you taste any ofthat chili or grapefruit
or is it just, it's too subtle probably?
- I don't remember tasting it.
I think maybe if I went back
and I knew that thosewere the kind of notes
I was looking for, I would get it.
But yeah, I don't remembertasting grapefruit.
- Well I think court bouillonis definitely a common
(16:09):
factor of cooking shrimp cocktail.
- Most definitely.
It's the standard whenit comes to cooking.
But should it be?- I don't know.
The other thing that I have a gripe with
in terms of shrimp cocktail
and I don't have that many gripes.
This is probably the only one.
Jonathan, when you're at a restaurant
and you see shrimp cocktail,
what section on the menuis it usually listed under?
(16:29):
- Isn't that under apps first course?
- Raw bar.
- Raw bar. It's under the raw bar section.
- It's under the raw bar.
And that's not right
because shrimp cocktail is in fact cooked.
- It's cooked.- Doesn't that make you mad?
- Do you think a lot ofpeople think it's raw?
- People think it's raw.
And so I think people were like,
I don't like sushi, Idon't like raw stuff.
They don't need to order shrimp cocktail
(16:50):
and they're missing out.
That's a cooked food.- Interesting. Yeah.
- You guys, I have to say you have not
touched your shrimp cocktail.
- I would absolutely love some.
- Should we have a shrimp cocktail break?
- Yes.- Yeah.
- Oh my God, look at him.
There were seven shrimpin the shrimp cocktail
and we are three people.
Boom!- [Jonathan] Wow.
- Well that was a one biter Bryan.
And you like sucked itout. That was crazy.
(17:12):
- That came off prettyclean too, that tail.
- It's firm. A little snappy.
I would say, it's oddly salty to me.
Maybe a little saltier than I would like.
And it has an oceanic flavor
that maybe is not totally welcome.
- So you hate it.
- I would say it's not myfavorite shrimp cocktail.
(17:32):
- I like those. I like oceanic.
- Jonathan's thoughtson the shrimp cocktail?
- I think I would've likedmore cocktail sauce on there.
I think that's...- I'm sorry
that of cocktail sauceis not enough for you?
- I mean, on my specific shrimp
I would've dunked all the waydown to the tail maybe almost.
You know, like if I were here alone.
- Does size matter toyou in terms of shrimp?
(17:53):
Do you want a U 10?
Which for listeners at home
who are not constantlythinking about shrimp,
cocktail means that perpound you're getting
under 10 shrimp.
So they're big.
- I mean, I think similarly to oysters,
I think like I don't want 'em too small
and I don't want 'em too big, you know?
- Okay. A goldilock situation.
- Goldilock situation.
(18:15):
I would say that thesethat we're having right now
are kind of ideal.
I wouldn't want 'em muchbigger than that. I would say.
- This seems like classic
sort of like cartoonrendering shrimp size.
- Yeah.- Yeah,
these are pretty ideal.
- One other thing that I just,
talking about the seven shrimp on here,
there's three of us I think like maybe
this is something we get into,
but the odd number ofshrimp that is often served
in a shrimp cocktail.
Because I kind of agree with you, Bryan,
(18:36):
it's like something that youlike to share with people.
It's something that likeyou can eat it on your own,
but it's nice to have,
and I think it should be a law
that every restaurant says on the menu
how many shrimp you getin a shrimp cocktail.
So it's not a surprise you'reeating with someone else
and then five shrimp comes out
and next thing you knowyou're divorced, you know?
- I actually kind of likeit as a way to, you know,
(18:57):
separate the boys fromthe men, so to speak.
- Expand on this.
Like, if I'm eating with Bryan,
I'm going to be like, "Can I have that?"
And he's going to be like, "Youshould, that's your shrimp.
You should take thatshrimp." So I'm a man.
- I'm a boy.- [Hannah] Yes.
- Am I a good boy?- You're a good boy.
- Great.
- Jonathan, you said thatsetting really matters
(19:18):
when you're eating shrimp cocktail.
Does shrimp cocktail automaticallymake you feel fancier
or is it only whenyou're in a fancy place?
- I think shrimp cocktail
can kind of like reallyjust make whatever situation
you're in feel moreintense in a lot of ways.
I think if you're eatingit in a nice restaurant,
you're going to feel even fancier.
(19:38):
But if you're eating it in a dirty bar,
which sometimes they will serve
shrimp cocktails or something,
you're going to feel worse about yourself.
- Right.- 'Cause you're eating it.
- It doesn't make you feelfancier at a dive bar.
You roll up to the dive bar,you order the shrimp cocktail
and no one's like, Hey, youthink you're better than me?
I don't know why that's what people
in the dive bar sound like.
That's probably offensive.
- Yeah, brings you further down I think.
(19:58):
- Yeah. It's a high low food.
It can be your sort of like dingy.
It place's been around for decades,
shrimp cocktail order.
Or it can be served atthe finest of steakhouse.
Bryan and I had a really sortof, I'm going to go ahead
and say like run of themill shrimp cocktail
at a place called Tracks.
(20:19):
Which is near Penn Station and MSG
and Moynihan Train Hall.
- It made me feel fancy.- It did make me feel fancy.
It's was cooked with like true excellence.
Like it was had thelittle flop that you want,
but still firm enough.
It smelled, yeah, like the ocean floor.
But it smelled like my boyfriend's shoes
(20:41):
after he works a longservice in the kitchen.
- And this is like at a sports bar
in the shadow of Penn Station.
We're one of 10 people there,
but the place easily seats a hundred.
- It used to be underground.And then they moved.
It has the vibe of a placethat was formerly underground.
It looks like a diner.
It behaves like a dive bar.
(21:05):
Like Bryan got Guinness
and I got some, I don'tknow, some silly pilsner
or something.
And it's actually a rawbar. It's a lovely place.
- Wow.- I think we should go
have drinks there after this.
- But yeah, it did make you feel fancy
at that very un-fancy place.- [Hannah] Yeah.
- I'm pretty sure Hannahoffended the server too.
Hannah, what did you say?
You said, "Wow, thisis surprisingly good."
(21:27):
- I didn't say it like that.
- And then the bartender waslike, "Why is that surprising?
We're a raw bar."
- And then Bryan had to make me backpedal
and I was like, wow, you know,
some people are shrimp cocktail people
and some people aren't.
And so it's a really divisive thing.
- And now we're banned from Tracks.
- [Speaker] Shout out to Tracks
who provided this shrimp cocktail.
(21:47):
- No way. Okay.
Shout out to Tracks who provided...
- Shout out to Tracks.
- This incredible shrimp cocktail
that you just besmirched.
You, oh, it's a little salty.
- I was wrong.- It's interesting.
It plays into your point, Jonathan,
about setting like we are not in Tracks.
- We're not in Tracks.
This is actually how itlooked at Tracks though.
(22:07):
That's exactly how muchcocktail sauce we had
- Tracks fills up their martini glasses
to the brim with cocktail sauce.
- But they randomly stuff afew pieces of lettuce inside.
- I dunno why.- Shiso, they're shiso leaves.
- Oh shiso?- Yeah.
- So fancy.- Yeah.
- Is it in a clear glass like this?
- Yes it is.- Okay.
I mean I think that it doesmake a nice sort of tablescape,
it's nice to see in front of you
(22:29):
when you sit down at a table.
It also kind of makes you feel like
you're in Vegas in the 50s or something.
Which I think is always kindof a nice vibe for dinner.
- My understanding isthat shrimp cocktail,
the history of shrimp cocktailis very connected to Vegas.
That it was popularized inVegas in a casino in the 50s.
Which is maybe why youjust brought that up.
(22:50):
- That makes sense to me.- But my understanding is
that the origins of shrimp cocktail,
it started as oyster cocktail
because oysters were everywhere in,
I believe the 1800s.
Were going to have tofact check me on that.
- No, no, that sounds right.
- And then we overfished our oysters
and someone was like,uh-uh, what do we do?
And the reason it's called cocktail
(23:10):
is because they would take these oysters
and put it with cocktail sauce,
which was slightly different.
It was like more, it was like oyster share
and they would actuallydrink it with alcohol too.
And it was served as a drink in a glass,
which sounds like a dare now.
But that's why we call it shrimp cocktail.
- Yeah, that's still aroundactually oyster shooters,
you'll still see those kindof at bars and restaurants.
(23:30):
Yeah, kind of like Bloody Mary sauce
and alcohol in an oyster.- I mean, I'm down.
- Me too.
So I would say for me,
when it comes to orderingshrimp cocktail, first off,
99 out of a 100 times,
I will not order theshrimp cocktail on a menu.
- Why not?- Due to the price generally.
And also the fact that I don't think that
(23:50):
a lot of restaurants take shrimpcocktails seriously enough.
- Yeah. Yeah.
- You just need to poach some shrimp
and serve it with cocktail sauce
and boom, that shrimp cocktail.
The diners expectations just aren't there.
- What about at parties? Will you...
- At parties I will gobbledown shrimp cocktail.
- You'll gobble. Yeah.
It's funny, I asked a bunch of friends,
will you order shrimpcocktail at a restaurant
(24:12):
or is it just a party food to you?
And I think it was a pretty 50:50 split
about the restaurant ordersor the party gobblers.
And that to me is directly correlated
with how people feelabout sort of recklessly
spending money in restaurants.
You cannot be financially squeamish
and order shrimp cocktail.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- I don't even mean likeyou have to be rich.
(24:34):
You just have to be willingto spend money at restaurants.
And so it's like that alsokeeps prices also kind of high.
- Yeah, average price for shrimp cocktail
is probably around, what would you say?
Like $24?
- It depends where you are.- [Bryan] Yeah.
- It depends how new therestaurant is, I think also.
- I had one in Boston recently,this place called Pier 6.
(24:56):
- Oh, what were you doing in Boston?
- I was there for research
ahead of our ratings launch in Boston.
The Infatuation justlaunched ratings in Boston
a few weeks ago.
And this was all in preparation for that.
But Pier six, yeah, Iwould highly recommend
if you find yourself inBoston going to Pier 6,
(25:17):
it sort of juts out into the harbor.
It is an actual pier andyou can sit on the roof
and kind of just like, you know,
I think it was four shrimp
that they serve you at Pier 6, $28.
Same price as The View. AndI would say similar size.
- Yeah.- And it's a fantastic
shrimp cocktail with a goodamount of cocktail sauce
(25:40):
on the side.
Tails slip off easily.
- You love this tail slip?
- I think it's important.I think it's important.
- It's almost erotic theway you're talking about it.
I'm sorry you're my coworker,but it's like so intense.
- That's a very Hannah thing to say.
I'm sorry. I apologize.
- [Hannah] I'm still learninghow to talk to people.
- Yeah. Yeah.
(26:01):
- If you're looking forgreat seafood in your city,
check out our guides
and reviews on the Infatuation.com
or at Infatuation on Instagram
or at TheInfatuation on TikTok.
- Now we're going to play a game called
"How much does that shrimp cocktail cost?"
We're going to start with Dirty French,
which is a place for steaks in Miami.
(26:24):
And the menu description,simply "Shrimp Cocktail".
And our Infatuation reviewfrom editor Ryan Pfeffer says,
"This order includes six fairly large,
tasty shrimp sprinkled with chives.
It's served with a solidhouse cocktail sauce
and what's supposed to be spicy remoulade,
although it's not very spicy at all."
(26:44):
What do you guys think?
- Wow. Guess how much thatshrimp cocktail costs?
Crucially, you got tokeep in mind Dirty French
is a major food group restaurant.
So a sister restaurantof carbon. Not cheap.
- [Hannah] Yep.- Jonathan, you have any
initial thoughts here?
- I would say $32.
- I was leaning $32 as well.
Maybe it's steep though. I don't know.
- I'm going $28.- $28. Yeah.
- Alright. What is it, Hannah?
(27:05):
- $33.- Ooh!
- I way off.
- That's a steep cocktail. That's steep.
- Because are so muchbetter than me at this.
- Yeah, we're better thanyou at a lot of stuff.
- Yeah, that's true.- Okay, let's,
we'll do HMS BOUNTY.
So this is from HMS BOUNTY in LA
and the Infatuation review here.
(27:25):
It's written by Brant Cox
and our editor in chief Arden Shore.
"The straightforward version here,
four shrimp classic cocktail sauce,
and two packets ofsaltines, isn't only good
because of the settingor the shot in beer combo
you just knocked back.
It's good because of theshrimp are plump, chilled
and delicious."
- Shot beer combos.
(27:46):
- Yeah. That to me implies cheaper.
- Keep in mind, four shrimp. Four shrimp.
- Fancy place of servedfor shrimp cocktail
- $15.75.
- I think it's going to be, Ithink we're going like $20, $24.
- I'm going to say $19.95.- I like that.
- I love the 95.
(28:07):
- So the shrimp cocktailat HMS BOUNTY in LA
will set you back $11 and 99 cents.
- Oh, hotdog. Let's go.
- Let's go there.- Let's go. That's fun.
- That is a good deal.- Okay HMS BOUNTY.
Okay, LA.
The next one is BLVD STEAK,
which is a steakhouse in LA.
The menu description says
(28:28):
"Jumbo shrimp cocktail, mustard aioli
and cocktail sauce."
From our guide to the bestshrimp cocktail in Los Angeles,
which was penned by BrantCox and Arden Shore.
They say. "Dry ice smokeshould normally be reserved
for haunted houses and arena rock shows.
But at BLVD STEAK,
(28:48):
a splashy modern steakhousein Sherman Oaks, it's a fun
and slightly silly way to make a dish
that always looks more orless the same stand out."
It's going to be pricey.
- I don't want dry ice on my shrimp.
- No, that seems like hazardous.
- Yeah.
- Oof. The place is described as splashy.
- Are we sure it's pronouncedBLVD STEAK too? It says BLVD.
(29:09):
- Right.
- You're paying for that abbreviation.
- So what are you guessing?
- I'm going with $36.- $36?
- I'm sorry, I got to do something.
I've been losing you, okay?
- [Hannah] You got to go bold.
- I do think this one's going to be
on the pricier side of thing.
I'm going to say $30 for this one.
(29:29):
- Okay. I think thisis a per shrimp price.
I think we're going, it's $5 per shrimp.
- Oh, okay.
- And you can order as many as you want.
- What did you say again?- I said $30.
Why didn't you ask me what I said?
- $34 is the winner.
- So Bryan, you got it.One point for Bryan.
(29:51):
- Alright.
Next up we have Sweetings in London.
The menu description, "Prawn Cocktail",
because that's what they callshrimp cocktail over there.
- Yeah, wait, we need to aminute to explain the difference
between prawn cocktailand shrimp cocktail.
'Cause I was horrified to learn this.
It's basically a chopped up salad
of shrimp with somethingcalled Marie Rose sauce,
(30:14):
which is like tomato and mayo
and sort of like a thousand island
minus the pickle or relish.
And it's all like slapped into a bowl
and then like covered with sauce.
It's really gnarly looking. I have to say.
- Yeah, I've seen pictures of it.
- [Hannah] Yeah.- It sounds bad.
- It doesn't look goodto me, but I don't know.
I don't know.
(30:34):
- Our Infatuation review of Sweetings says
that their prawn cocktailis "Pyrex bowl, check.
Shredded iceberg lettuce, check.
A pile of prawns andMarie Rose sauce, check.
It looks and tastes as you'd expect."
Okay. So that's not...
- Which sounds like a bad thing.
- They don't seem to love it,
but it also sounds pretty standard, so.
(30:56):
I'm going with seven pounds.They use pounds, right?
- Yeah.- Yeah.
- But what's the conversion right now?
- I don't know. Just go with your gut.
- I think it's going to be,I mean, London's expensive
and they like weird stuff over there.
So I think maybe 14 pounds.
- I feel like, I'm going to say 12 pounds.
(31:18):
- Okay.- Okay.
You ready for the price?- Yeah.
- At Sweetings in Londonfor the prawn cocktail,
you are going to pay 12 pounds 50.
- Okay, I was close.
- I continue to be very bad at this game.
I think Jonathan's winning.
If you care for theconversion that is around $16.
- Oh my God.
Well that's, I mean, it'scheaper than what we're paying.
(31:40):
- But, it's a steal,- But it's a, you know,
chopped up shrimp in a Pyrex bowl.
- Yeah. Yeah.- Not worth it.
- Good job everyone. That was fun.
- Yeah, I won.- No.
- [Bryan] Yeah.- No, I think Jonathan won.
- Jonathan out shrimped us.
- You always out shrimp us.
- Where's your favorite shrimp cocktail?
Let us know in thecomments or shoot us a dm.
(32:03):
- So clearly there areshrimp cocktail versions
that cost 11 ish dollars at a, you know,
old school more bar like place.
And then there on the otherside you have your dry ice
shrimp cocktail for $36,
- $34. I think it was.- $34.
And so there's a prettysignificant range there.
(32:26):
What do you make of that?
I mean, do the factors of size
and setting, they seem toreally make a difference
in terms of price.
If you're eating the $34 shrimp cocktail,
it's so much better thanthe $11 shrimp cocktail.
- Yeah, I guess it really depends on
the technique that's used
(32:46):
and then the presentationI guess to an extent.
But it's more about you'repaying for setting as well.
But, so setting, technique, presentation,
and then the shrimp itself,
I think that could make ashrimp cocktail cost that much.
The question is, would youpay $34 for a shrimp cocktail?
It could be better thanthe $11 shrimp cocktail
for a range of factors.
(33:07):
You have to consider all of it.
And I think that's what wedo with the Infatuation.
We consider all of thefactors, the presentation,
the setting, the shrimp itself.
And then the techniquethat's applied to the shrimp.
So all of that just goesinto the experience.
It's not just the shrimpthat you're eating.
It's everything. So would we pay more?
Would I pay more for a dry icepresentation? Probably not.
(33:28):
But the writers in LA speakhighly of it and I trust them.
So maybe it is just a good fun time.
Would you pay $34 for any shrimp cocktail?
- No, I would not.
I think all shrimpcocktails should cost $18.
- Ooh, I love that.- I think that's like
the sort of like a good baseline.
And you can have that on a menu
(33:50):
and you know, as a serveryou could tell someone
about it with a straight face.
You're trying to, $34 shrimp cocktail
is I think ridiculous, you know?
- That's a huge shrimp cocktail.
- Anything cheaper thanthat is like you're really
questioning like wherethat shrimp's coming from
and if it's actually any good
or just going to make you sick.
$18.
- $18 is good for a restaurant.
I mean, to me, now that I'vehad Penny's shrimp cocktail
(34:10):
and it costs $24, which Ithink is a reasonable price
for what we know to be a dishthat requires, you know, labor
and thought and ingredients like, sure.
Not to, you know, soundlike a broken shrimp record.
I went to Penny, Penny's shrimpcocktail. We had a Penny.
Penny. You should go to Penny.
But the Penny texture was my ideal
(34:33):
because it almost had the like creamy
floppy thing that likewhen you go to have sushi
and you have the raw eby, the shrimp.
It has that texture,
it has that sweetness,but it's cooked shrimp.
I actually don't know howthey get it like that.
- [Bryan] Yeah.- And I'd love to know.
- How do they get that?
(34:53):
Well, I talked to, tell me now the chef
Joshua Pinsky of Penny.
First off Joshua says,we used gold shrimp,
tiger shrimp, blue shrimp,
pretty much every shrimp,seafood purveyors had
that is on the R&D process.
He went through all those kinds of shrimp.
And eventually landed onthe Argentinian red shrimp.
(35:14):
I'm very familiar withArgentinian red shrimp, he says,
and I wanted to try to findsomething a little more local,
but quality wise in terms of texture
and flavor, they beat everything else out.
Now in terms of preparation,
how to get to that perfect texture?
Here it is.
So Joshua says, "Whenyou cook shrimp cocktail,
you're poaching them in a potof flavored hot water, right?
(35:35):
And then you tend to take them out
and cool them in ice waterso they stopped cooking.
Well, if you boil the shrimp
and put them in ice water,
you're just rinsing off the flavor."
So Joshua says, "Instead of cooking it
in a seasoned court bouillon,
we just steam the shrimp."
Steaming seems key.- Whoa!
- Joshua says, "When we'resteaming it, there's no flavor.
(35:58):
That's why we cure them first."
The cure is essentially just salt
and baking soda, Ibelieve is what he said.
The baking soda is to retainthe plumpness of the shrimp.
And that I think is a common trick.
- He's a mad scientist.
- But that the real trick is that he says,
'After it's steamed, thenwe cool it salted fish sauce
(36:18):
water essentially."
Yeah, there's other stuff in there.
But he calls it salted fish sauce water,
essentially to make sure they have umami.
- Oh my God.- Is the trick.
That and the variety that they chose
after going through somany different types,
they landed on Argentinian red shrimp.
- Well, when we publish ourshrimp cocktail cookbook,
we can include that.
They make their owncocktail sauce, I assume.
Not with ketchup, but like with tomatoes.
(36:39):
- So it is with ketchup.
- They pretty much doketchup times ketchup.
It's double ketchup.
They use ketchup
and then they make theirown ketchup pretty much.
And add it to that.- Wow.
- Yeah, so like tomatopastes, vinegar, horse radish,
and then horse radish oil as well.
Which I think it gives it a nice kick.
That horse radish oil.
- If you've gotten thisfar in this episode
(37:00):
about shrimp cocktail,you should go to Penny
and to experience theheight of shrimp cocktail.
- Absolutely, go to Penny.
Chef Joshua Pinsky takes hisshrimp cocktail very seriously.
- But the thing that chefsdon't want you to know
is that shrimp is cheap as hell.
- How cheap we talking?- I'll tell you,
I was snooping around.
(37:22):
I was asking some chefs, "Hey,you serve shrimp cocktail.
How much you paying for shrimp?"
People did not want totell me on the record.
And I asked some people anonymously
what these restaurant ownerswere paying for their shrimp.
And I got some answers.
- All right, let's hear it.- So restaurants usually order
(37:43):
their shrimp by the case, which is not,
you know, like you or me.
That would be extraordinary.
And a case is usually like40 ish pounds of shrimp.
So I heard from someone who is a line cook
and they will remain anonymous.
They said that they weregetting Louisiana prawns
(38:03):
for around $600 for 40ish pounds of shrimp.
So just for an exercise,
let's so say those prawns are like U 12,
so they're like 12 prawns per pound.
That's 480 prawns in 40 pounds.
Which if you do the math isabout a dollar 25 per prawn.
(38:25):
And I was like, huh, maybethat's a just one off example.
I'll give you another example.
So this is like shrimpthat's like white all natural
from this brand calledOishi, which is great.
They sell it in the grocerystore. You can get it frozen.
Good to have in your freezer.
That costs a restaurant who I won't name
(38:47):
$11.99 per pound.
So they're getting about 14or fewer shrimp per pound.
So it's going to costthe restaurant like $12
for 14 shrimp.
And each shrimp is a little over a dollar.
So if you are paying $34for your shrimp cocktail,
just know that that shrimp cannot possibly
(39:09):
cost more than a couple dollars.
How does that make youfeel? Does it anger you?
- I feel, I mean, I don't know.
I would need to talk to some NYC folks
and like get the numbers here.
Maybe it's different.It doesn't feel great.
I feel a little betrayed.
- Yeah.- But at the same time,
I wasn't really orderingshrimp cocktail to begin with.
(39:29):
- Shrimp cocktail'sobjectively a silly order.
So it is there another silly order
that you are really into thatperhaps shrimp, you know,
people who don't get shrimp cocktail,
but they want a sillylittle order could try?
- I have a very silly order Ican tell you about right now,
but it is shrimp cocktail.- What?
- We can get into this later, so...
- No, come on, let's hear it.
(39:49):
- Well, recently at Cafe Chelsea,
I ordered a shrimp cocktail entree.
Do you know what that is?
- No.- No.
It's when you order two shrimpcocktails as your entree.
- Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I'm sorry.
Your even sillier order
is you'll get two ordersof shrimp cocktail.
- That's not an orderI'm really going to do.
I might do it for the bit going forward.
(40:11):
- It's really funny.
- I think that's purely for research.
- Yeah, that was really good.- To see if shrimp cocktail
could be an entree.
- Did it fill you up enough?
- It did. In a gross kind of way.
- Yeah. That doesn't, itdoesn't sound amazing.
It sounds like maybe too much.
- I asked the bartender ifpeople did it a lot or ever
and the bartender was like, no judgment.
They were just like, you know,
people do all sorts of things, man and...
(40:32):
- We've seen it all.
- Yeah, and then so they brought me
two shrimp cocktails side by side.
I have a picture, I can show it to you.
And then a side of fries,which was necessary.
- You should asked them to course it out.
- No, no, no. I didn't want.
I wanted the whole thing just right there.
- I know. But just imagine.
- So you could see what I was doing
and be disgusted.
By the eighth shrimp, I started to feel
a little disgusted shrimp.
They were a little too cold.
(40:52):
You don't want such a cold clammy dinner.
- The shrimp started to feel cadaverous.
That is the exact right word.
- It's a really good word.
- Maybe that's why it's thestart of the meal thing.
You just want a little,
a little cold cadaver to get you going.
(41:13):
- One cadaver's, okay.
By the time you get tothe eighth, it's too...
- Also not to mention gout.
That's a gout flare up maybe.
- So anyways.- So Jonathan
as our shrimp cocktail extraordinaire.
Shrimp cocktail expert,shrimp cocktail hero,
shrimp cocktail puritan.
- Yeah. Puritan?
(41:34):
I don't know if that's the right word.
- Shrimp cocktail.- Obsessive.
- Obsessive- Connoisseur.
- Where do you see shrimp cocktail
in terms of the future?
Are we still going to beordering shrimp cocktail?
What's your guess into the future here?
- I think that it is going to continue
to get prohibitively more expensive.
I think you know, it won't be long
(41:55):
before we're seeing a $50 shrimp cocktail,
I think, you know?
I also think it's sort of like,
along with that it'sreally primed, you know,
as you all might have heard,
they're putting proteinin everything these days
and figuring out the best way
to sort of fit that in askind of cleanly as possible.
And I think shrimp is agood source of protein.
I think, like people are going to pay
(42:16):
to just have that clean protein.
- So you're saying shrimp cocktail,
like you know how like gym bros will get
a lot of like grilled chicken?
So you think shrimp cocktail
might turn into a gym, bro food?
- I think, I think it's possible.
- Unfortunately, I thinkJonathan's guess is so accurate.
Protein is so in right now.
And it could either,
shrimp cocktails could take on new forms
(42:38):
such as the shrimp protein bar.
I could definitely seethat becoming a thing.
- I was thinking about thisfuture of shrimp cocktail
and you know, we canguess as much as we want,
but why not turn to theexperts on the subject.
- Who are the experts?- I did pay $30
(43:00):
to a psychic on Etsy.- Oh!
- $30 seems too cheap.
- Oh, like she should raise her rates?
The future of shrimp cocktail,
according to our Etsy psychic,
this is a worldwide forecast.
"Shrimp cocktail is notfading. It's being reborn.
Here comes fusion, shrimpcocktail will start borrowing
(43:22):
from international cultures.
Picture wasabi ponzu cocktailsin Japanese fusion spots.
Spicy tamarind sauces inLatin inspired eateries
or shrimp served with yogurt dips.
Shrimp cocktail will be re-imagined
as a gourmet small platerather than just an appetizer."
- The psychic sounds like Chat GPT,
- It's Chat GPT
(43:43):
and also just like akind of trend forecaster
more than a psychic.
- But guys, I also asked,
the first part of the question was,
what is my future of shrimpcocktail, like, personally,
what's my future of shrimp cocktail?
And they said,
"You and shrimp cocktailhave a karmic tie.
Shrimp cocktail for youwon't just be a dish,
it'll be a comfort anchor.
(44:03):
When things feel uncertain oryou need something familiar
and grounding the cooltexture, bright lemon
and sharp tank of cocktail sauce
will feel like a reset button."
- Hannah is definitely way more karmically
connected to shrimp cocktail than I am.
Observe the bright orange top,
Hannah is shrimp cocktail.- Don't talk about my top.
Will we all eat shrimpcocktail in the future?
(44:25):
- I'm still going toorder shrimp cocktail,
but like once a year,once every two years,
which is about howoften I order it anyway.
It was never about, it'snever about the money.
I mean that's the reasonwhy I don't order it.
But I never thought that shrimp cocktail
was a good use of money anyway.
- Yeah, I mean I do thinkthat shrimp cocktail
is a little too expensive.
(44:45):
But I think, you know, to kind of go back
to what we were saying earlier,
I think part of the reasonthat you're ordering
shrimp cocktail is not forthe value that you're getting.
It's like you want thatthing on your table.
It is something of like a,
it's a celebration in a glass, you know?
And I think that's why you do it.
And we're okay with paying
a premium for that sometimes, you know?
- I totally agree.
(45:05):
I'm going to continue toorder shrimp cocktail.
Shrimp is cheap, but it's delicious.
And shrimp cocktail is delicious.
And also I think, you know,
shrimp cocktail is a moneymaker hopefully for a reason.
Maybe that means on a menua chef is able to have
a dish that's a little lesscost-effective moneymaking
because they are raking in the dough
(45:27):
with their shrimp cocktail.
So the shrimp cocktaileaters are subsidizing
everybody else.
- Yes.- [Bryan] Wow.
- Yeah, so when you order shrimp cocktail,
just know you're doing asolid to everyone else.
- You're paying for somebody else's meal.
- [Hannah] Yeah.- Everyone should thank
their friendly shrimp cocktail eater.
- Jonathan, thank youso much for joining us
and talking about your shrimppreferences on the pod.
Hope you had a great time.
(45:48):
- Did you have a good time?- I had a fantastic time.
- What else did you?- A shrimp tastic.
- Oh God. Well, yougot to get out of here.
If you loved this episode,
if you were obsessed with this episode,
if you were religiouslychanged by this episode,
make sure to like, follow
and subscribe to RestaurantPeople on YouTube
or any of your preferredpodcast platforms.
(46:10):
I'm Hannah.
- I'm Bryan.
- Thanks for joining uson Restaurant People.
A show from Infatuation.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Paper Ghosts: The Texas Teen Murders
Paper Ghosts: The Texas Teen Murders takes you back to 1983, when two teenagers were found murdered, execution-style, on a quiet Texas hill. What followed was decades of rumors, false leads, and a case that law enforcement could never seem to close. Now, veteran investigative journalist M. William Phelps reopens the file — uncovering new witnesses, hidden evidence, and a shocking web of deaths that may all be connected. Over nine gripping episodes, Paper Ghosts: The Texas Teen Murders unravels a story 42 years in the making… and asks the question: who’s really been hiding the truth?
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com