Bored are we, let's have a prawn curry..................
The other day someone asked me how I put together the Prawn Curry I
make for visitors to Betty Towers. To be honest I just do it
automatically without much reference to a recipe, but the basics came
from a recipe in the Guardian magazine a couple of years ago.
Anyway, it's cheap, quick and the inmates here seem to like it.
(there's an NB which allows you to replace the prawns with chickpeas
and cauliflower and meataturions could add dead animal immediately after
the tin of tomatoes - just takes a longer cooking time to make sure you
don't get BSE)
Ingredients
2 tablespoons of oil
4 cloves
1 cardoman seed
1 large onion
Tin of tomatoes2 teaspoons of cumin seed
1 red or green chilli
1 red green or yellow pepper
1 teaspoon of mustard seeds
2 teaspoons of garam masala
3 cloves of garlic
4 tomatoes
fresh ginger (about a cubic inch in old money)
lemon juice
fresh coriander
500g of frozen peeled prawns (Caldera from Lidls seem to fit the bill)
Add them frozen!
Basmati rice or wholemeal pitta bread
Plain Yoghurt
I use a pan which is about 12” in diameter and 3” deep, it has a lid
and a good solid bottom.
Put the oil into the pan, gently heat it and add the oil, the cloves
and the cardoman.
Chop the onion into small pieces and addd to the pan when the oil has
warmed up enough to spit.
Whilst the onions cook, liquidise the tin of tomatoes and when the
onions start to brown add this to the pan.
Gently stir the liquid until the tomatoes have warmed up and then some
water (a third of the tin of the tomatoes works for me)
Once the liquor is simmering put it on a very low heat and start
chopping the chilli, pepper and garlic.
Then add the ingredients one by one: Chilli, Pepper, Mustard Seeds,
Garam Masala, stirring all the time. Once these ingredients are all in
the pan and stirred in let the pan simmer for five minutes, then turn
it off. Cover the pan with a lid.
Now finely chop the garlic, quarter the tomatoes and add them to the
pan, stirring them in gently. Again cover the pan and then grate the
ginger, squeeze the lemon and stir the results into the mixture.
Leave the pan to stand for at least 30 minutes then you can add the
prawns. Use a low heat and add the prawns gradually stirring gently as
you do so. Let the pan simmer but no more and only for about 5 minutes
as all you are doing is defrosting the prawns. Again replace the lid
and leave the pan to cook its contents in their own heat for five
minutes.
NB You can use this base curry for other ingredients – it's very nice
with chick peas and cauliflower – add a tin of organic chickpeas (the
Co-op do a good one) after the liquidised tin of tomatoes, chop the
cauliflower into lumps and steam for ten minutes and add after the
chickpeas. Half a spoonful of salt always helps here – you don't need
it with the prawns because they are frozen in salty water!
Serve the food from the pan garnished with finely chopped fresh
coriander sprinkled on the top of the pan's contents.
You can have warm wholemeal pitta breads with it or steamed basmati
rice. The yoghurt makes a nice addition too. As the curry cools it
tastes even better so don't rush to eat it piping hot. Goes great
with very cold white wine from the Languedoc :-)
This recipe will serve four happy smiling people.
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MARCHING ON TOGETHER (There's it)
