Prawn Patia for #RandomRecipeChallenge

I am either very brave or rather reckless.  The other night, I invited folks over for dinner to try out a whole new randomly chosen recipe, one I had never made before.  Granted, they were mostly college students and two of them were my daughters so it wasn’t a tough crowd.  But time was getting short (again!) for participating in +belleau kitchen's Random Recipe Challenge where, according to this month’s rules, we were supposed to make a recipe we had clipped and saved from a magazine or newspaper and this was the clipping I had chosen for this month.

It has been among my recipe clippings for a very long time but I had yet to try it.  I have no idea of its provenance so I can’t give credit where due.  But I looked up Prawn Patia on the ever-helpful internet to discover that it is originally a Persian dish that made its way to India with the Parsees.  Who knew?  All I can tell you is that it was roundly acclaimed delicious and I am sorry it took me so long to get around to cooking it.  If you have cookbooks you are under-using or clippings that have been neglected, you might want to start accepting the Random Recipe Challenge as well!

Ingredients
1 1/2 lbs or 600g raw prawns or shrimp (peeled and deveined)
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon turmeric (I screwed up and used ground cumin instead – didn’t miss it, still delicious.  If you are a fan of cumin, you might want to do the same.)
1 teaspoon cayenne
3 onions
3 large tomatoes or 5 Roma tomatoes
Olive oil
1 large bunch cilantro or fresh coriander
1-2 green chilies or jalapeños
3 cloves garlic
2 inches or 5cm piece fresh ginger
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 heaped teaspoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice (As you can see, the original recipe called for tamarind but I couldn’t find any here in Providence.)

Method
Put your prawns in a large bowl and sprinkle on the salt, cayenne and turmeric (or cumin - see note above in Ingredients.)  Give the whole thing a good stir and set aside.

Slice your onions finely then chop your tomatoes.

Sauté the onions, with a good couple of glugs of olive oil, in a large pot that is big enough for all of your ingredients.

Meanwhile, peel and mince the ginger and garlic.  Finely chop your fresh pepper/s.

Wash the cilantro and chop the stem end of the bunch.  Add the chopped stems to the prawns and stir.  Chop the rest of the cilantro roughly and set aside.

Yeah, there are some leaves in there too.  Don't sweat the small stuff. 

Cook the onions down until they are completely soft and possibly a little golden in color.  Add the garlic, ginger and peppers to the pot and cook briefly before adding in the tomatoes.

Cook until the onions and tomatoes have melted into a sauce.  Add in the cumin and stir well.

Add the prawns and half of the chopped cilantro. and cook until the prawns are done, which shouldn’t take more than 10-15 minutes.  Taste for salt and add a little more, if necessary.

Add in your fresh lime juice and brown sugar.  Stir well and serve.

Use the balance of the chopped cilantro for garnish.  I served this on top of coconut rice that my younger daughter made with this recipe except we skipped the extra grated coconut.  The coconut flavor made a lovely addition to the dish.  In fact next time, I might just add the coconut milk to the prawns and serve this over normal white rice.

Enjoy!

Head on over to Dom’s blog and have a look at all the lovely Random Recipes my fellow bloggers have posted this month.  

Roasted Corn-Off-The-Cob Shrimp Cakes

Yesterday I found a new blog. Truth be told, I found a few! But this one in particular caught my fancy because the very latest post, and therefore, the first one I read, spoke eloquently of corn, freshly roasted on the cob, scenting the afternoon air of northern Paris.  Then the recipe that followed was for some delicious corn cakes, but not using the roasted corn!  I was so surprised that I left the author a comment.  How could she resist the roasted corn?! I simply could not, so then I had to try it my way.  Somewhere along the recipe path, I also ended up adding fresh shrimp and cayenne pepper.  See what you think.

Ingredients

1/2 cup yellow cornmeal

1 cup low-fat milk

3 medium cobs of corn, shucked and cleaned

2 eggs

1 tablespoon softened butter

1/2 cup all-purpose flour + 1 good tablespoon

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, or to taste

1/2 bunch of scallions or green onion tops, chopped finely

105g or 2 3/4oz sharp cheddar cheese, grated

285g or 10.5oz shrimp or prawns. (Weight after peeling and deveining.)

Method

In a medium bowl, stir together the corn meal and milk and set aside.

Heat your griddle pan really hot and put the cobs of corn on it. Weigh them down with a filled kettle or some other heavy item that can tolerate heat.

Keep turning the cobs and replacing the kettle until all the sides are nice and charred.  Remove from the pan and let cool.

Cut the kernels off the cobs with a sharp knife.

Pop them into a food processor,  add in the eggs and the softened butter and chop them up a little.  Do not completely pulverize. You want to still see char and corn kernels.  Spoon this mixture into the bowl with the corn meal mixture and stir together until combined. 

Chop your shrimp into little pieces and add them to the bowl.

Stir in the green onions and cheddar cheese.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and cayenne.  (If you are not cooking and serving immediately, put the egg/shrimp mixture into the refrigerator and wait until you are ready to go before continuing with the next step.) Gently mix these dry ingredients into the wet mixture until just combined.

Heat a skillet over medium heat and oil with oil, butter or cooking spray.  Cook the cakes on both sides until done, just as you would normal pancakes.

 The original post suggested topping the cakes with seasoned Greek yogurt and I concur. (Do check out the link! I really liked her blog.) However, I discovered at the last minute that my yogurt was sweetened and that just did not go.  So I substituted sour cream.  Sour cream is hard to come by regularly in Kuala Lumpur so I make my own by mixing 1/2 cup whipping cream with 1/2 tablespoon lemon juice.  Works a dream. 

Cream, lemon juice, green onions, salt and pepper. 

The lemon juice thickens the cream beautifully. 

Serve each set of cakes with a dollop of the seasoned sour cream and a leafy green salad simply dressed in vinaigrette. 

Enjoy!