Spicy Shrimp & Spring Rolls

I went home one weekend and was excited to have a stove again. I was going to make some pork picadillo that sounded pretty delicious. (Recipe here.) I didn't, however, because my mom wanted me to use the leftover shrimp she had.

So I began peeling and deveining a pound of irregularly sized shrimp. This takes forever, everyone. Once done, I tossed the shrimp in some olive oil, paprika, cayenne pepper, and garlic and threw them in the pan.

They tasted pretty good, actually. I made a lame attempt at garnishing the plate of just shrimp.

Just when I was about to make an accompanying salad, my brother walks in and announces he has a sore throat and won't be able to eat. Darn it--the only willing meat-eater around!

My mom makes me feel better by whipping out everything needed to make fresh spring rolls. You usually put plain, unboiled shrimp in them. But we could use the spicy shrimp. Why not!

Here you can see the heap of lettuce and fresh herbs (mint, sawtooth herb, some other things I do not know the name of). My mom is also slicing up some cucumber unto her plate, which already contains the wet rice paper and herbs. We happened to have some unripe mango lying around, so we decided to add it in.

Here is a step-by-step layering of the ingredients.

I couldn't take a picture of myself rolling them up. That's too many hands that I don't have. So here's an action shot of my mom:

And this is her finished product, with the shrimp all lined up inside the roll. And some obligatory fish sauce with chili. Almost every Vietnamese dish needs fish sauce!

Sorry about taking up so much room on the blog, but I love pictures of food! Does anyone know how to hide part of the entry under a cut?

Anyway...these were pretty good. I prefer my spring rolls with plain shrimp, though. That way the sauce and all the herbs get to contribute their own delicious flavors. Oh well! At least we did something with all that shrimp.