In an effort to diversify my kitchen productions, I’ve been looking for new food blogger challenges to have fun with. One of my favorite challenges I have found so far is the “Cheese of the Month” challenge from Adventures in Gluttony, which provides a monthly cheese suggestion to create something delicious with.

This month’s featured cheese is feta, which coincidentally happens to be one of my favorite cheeses.  I use feta and it’s cousin white cheese (Turkish ‘beyaz peynir’) almost interchangably, the latter being slightly less salty. I usually have a block of feta stored in some fresh water in my fridge, and eat it often plain, for breakfast, with a little slice of tomato and cucumber and a slice of toast with jam. Or, I crumble it on salads, into soups, or even on burgers.

For the challenge I decided to incorporate it into my lunch, baked with shrimp. This is a very loose adaptation of a broiled recipe my mother uses that I love and really should get a hold of, but nevertheless it was quick, easy and very very tasty. The feta I used was Mt. Vikos, which I picked up at Cowgirl Creamery in the Ferry Building in downtown San Francisco. I only used an ounce of feta (all I had left), but the flavor still comes out wonderfully!

A Quick lunch: Baked Shrimp with Feta
serves 1

Ingredients:
4 or 5 shrimp (I used frozen)
A few small canned San Marzano tomatoes, with juice
1/4 cup frozen peas
1 ounce feta
a pinch salt,
a pinch pepper
a couple of good pinches oregano

Method:
1. Couldn’t be simpler: In a baking dish lined with foil, put all the ingredients, stirring gently to allow the tomato juice to coat everything. Whack it in the oven at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes, until shrimp are pink and cooked.

To serve: I served this over a bed of steamed rice, usually I use brown, but I’ve run out and need to pick up some more. I use frozen single servings of rice that I cook and wrap while still warm, which traps the moisture and allows you to easily pop one into the microwave and eat for lunch as if it was freshly made.