It has been a week since my wife left for France and I have not cooked yet, subsisting on leftovers (almost). On a side note, I think that it is pretty ridiculous that I would even have this quantity of leftovers in the first place. I opened the refrigerator and saw that there was a half pound of bay shrimp in there. Uh oh, not something to be hanging around too long,

I did have to do some prep and mixing to make this shrimp cocktail. This is why I said almost none. While technically it is not cooking, it is more than microwaving a plate or simply eating out of the fridge. This particular version is the Mexican one and my favorite style of shrimp cocktail.

You can find a number of different recipes for coctel de cameron. I will use my words in the basic groups for simplicity: shrimp, pico de gallo, cucumber and avacado in tomato juice. My wife likes hers’ on the sweeter side so that is where I gravitate. Ketchup and orange soda in the right proportions for sweetness and thickness go into my version. In addition to my mystery shrimp, I also had a side container of ketchup, tomato sauce and sliced tomatoes from burgers we made. So, I got to use all those things up as well.

Strict adherents to Mexican food would say things like use white onion in your pico de gallo. It is true that I think that it works better but I use what I have. The same goes with quantity. I mean who really knows what is 1/2 cup of diced onion? From my experience, I would say about a quarter of an onion, but don’t get hung up on things. I used the quantity I had leftover.

After making the pico, dice the avacado and cucumber and dump all of the ingredients together. Salt, sweeten and bitter to your own tastes. I like to let it set together an hour or two. Serve with saltines or tortilla chips and enjoy with an ice cold cerveza.

Feel free to add your favorite hot sauce as well. It is also often garnished with additional limes. I think it is a little weird, but some restaurants offer you a choice of tepid or cold. I suppose that it is really an homage to the traditional lack of refrigeration in Mexico.

End Your Programming Routine: When you are sweating outside, eating a chilled serving of shrimp cocktail is refreshing. You know when you are hot and you don’t feel like eating anything? This changes that dynamic. It is also a good platform to use up little bits of leftovers juices, sauces and vegetables outside of prescribed recipes.