The first quiches I ever made followed recipes from The French Chef cookbook by Julia Child. I have continued to use those recipes and make those quiches and now consider them my classic quiches. One was a shrimp quiche. I thought of that and wondered why I had never adapted this for a frittata. Now I have, and I am therefore calling this my classic shrimp frittata.
The frittata follows the original Julia Child recipe with a few modifications. She just has the cheese sprinkled over the top. I have included additional cheese in the quiches and now the frittata. I like cheese! And she has one starting with cooked shrimp. But the instructions for the preparation of the shrimp, which I am following exactly, have the shrimp cooking for plenty of time to cook raw shrimp. So I use uncooked shrimp.
Classic shrimp frittata
3/4–1 cup shrimp, cut into pieces (I cut 31/40 shrimp into 2 or 3 pieces)
1–1/2 tablespoons butter
1/4 teaspoon tarragon
fresh ground pepper
1/4 cup white wine
1/3 cup grated Gruyere cheese plus more for the top
3 eggs
1 tablespoon tomato paste
oil
Put the eggs into a large bowl, add the tomato paste, and whisk vigorously until the tomato paste is combined with the eggs. This takes a few minutes, so I did this first.
Melt the butter in a pan. Add the shrimp and cook for 2 minutes, turning over. Add the tarragon and pepper. Add the wine and boil vigorously until it is boiled down with mainly the butter remaining. Remove the shrimp from the pan.
Put some oil into a clean pan and let it get hot. Add a small amount of the egg mixture to the pan to set the bottom of the frittata to prevent sticking. Turn the heat down to medium low. Mix the shrimp and cheese into the eggs and pour the mixture into the pan. Cook this for about 5 minutes to set the bottom and sides.
Preheat the broiler. When the 5 minutes cooking on the stove are up, put some more of the shredded cheese on the top and place the pan under the broiler, about 6 to 7 inches below. Cook until the top is set and just starts to brown. This is about 1–1/2 to 2 minutes for me, but watch closely.
Remove from the broiler, loosen up the sides with a spatula if necessary, and slide the frittata out onto the serving plate.
Salads and Frittatas 