Peeled and cooked hot water garnish with tail on it. Litopenaeus vannamei Is a genus of cephalopods of the family Penaeidae. For Mexican fishermen, Litopenaeus vannamei has always been an important species. In the course of the 20th century, this species began to grow, initially in America, but later also in Asia (especially China, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia) largely to replace the indigenous Asian tiger shrimp Penaeus monodon. The white-seed shrimp lives in the eastern Pacific, along the coast of Mexico to northern Peru.