I like to cook for my friends to show my appreciation of them. @nainaztengra has been a friend of mine on Steemit for awhile and she is very supportive. I have really enjoyed getting to know her better on discord and when I found out that she likes prawns and spicy food, I knew exactly what I would do. I would cook her a dish to say thank you and that I appreciate her friendship. The only problem is that she lives 7000 miles away. So, my next best plan was to cook the meal and make a "Dish Dedication" to her.
The dish is spicy prawn stir fry. These prawns have amazing flavor, especially in the head. The dish gets a fresh dose of aromatics from the ginger, garlic and scallions. I use a lot of these aromatics and they become the vegetable to go with the prawns. The spicy kick comes from the fiery hot fresh red chillies. When the prawn oil mixes with the wine and soy sauce, it makes a soulful sauce. This dish is perfect with steamed rice.
The first step was to get some high quality prawns. I went into NYC and found these wild tiger prawns at the fish market.
Ingredients
- 5 large prawns, leave the head and tail on, but peel and devein the midsection.
- Vegetable oil for frying
- 1/2 cup sliced scallions
- 2 cloves of garlic minced
- 1/2 cup sliced fresh red chillies
- 1/4 cup julienned fresh ginger
- 1/4 cup Shaoxing wine
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 pinch of sugar
Method
First we need to fry the prawn heads in oil. We do this because the heads take longer to cook than the meat of the prawns. Plus, when we fry the prawn heads the oil gets infused with delicious prawn flavor. We then use that oil to cook the dish.
- Hold the prawns by the tail and dunk the heads into hot oil for a minute to cook. Then put them onto a plate to cool.
- Heat up two tablespoons of the prawn oil in a sauté pan and then add the ginger, garlic and scallions. Stir fry for 15 seconds.
- Next add the prawns, chilies, wine and sugar. Stir fry this for one minute.
- Turn off the heat and then stir in the soy sauce. You do not want the soy sauce to burn, that is why I add it at the end.
- Plate the dish and enjoy!
Nainaz, I hope that you enjoyed your dish. I certainly did! It was a pleasure to make this dish for you and hopefully one day our families can meet and share a meal together.
Your friend,
Steve