Spicy Prawn and Chicken Skewers

/


The temperature has dropped over the last week and we're in the sweet spot of outdoor living - which means barbeque time. I get a bit tired of the usual steak, lamb chops and sausages, so this weekend I marinated some chicken and prawns, skewered them and fired up the barbie to give them a lovely smoky flavour. An added benefit to skewers, is that it's a fun way to children to try new food, neither of the little chefs had eaten prawns before this weekend, but were happy to try them on a stick.

Marinades are typically acid and fat based, so in this case I've used coconut cream as the fat component and citrus as the acid, and thrown in some serious flavour from herbs. When marinating prawns, go easy on the citrus and add more just before cooking - adding it too early may cook the prawns before they've even hit the grill (though would make for a nice prawn ceviche). I buy my prawns at Megamart as they're the only supermarket that will devein as well as peel the prawns.


Prawn Skewers

  • 500 grams prawns, peeled and deveined
  • 2 tablespoons green curry paste (Mae Ploy, Thai King, or even better home-made)
  • 1 teaspoon fish sauce
  • 1 clove of garlic, minced
  • small handful of thai basil, shredded
  • 200 mls coconut milk
  • 1 teaspoon grated palm sugar (use brown if you don't have it)
  • juice of a lime
  • 1/2 teaspoon grated kaffir lime rind (or 4 kaffir lime leaves, stem removed and shredded finely)

Method
  1. Put all but the lime juice and prawns into a food processor and blitz until well combined and basil is finely minced. Squeeze in half the lime juice
  2. Marinate the prawns in the mixture for at least an hour and up to 3 hours, stirring occasionally. Add in the juice of the remaining half lime.
  3. Thread onto soaked skewers and grill for 5 minutes on the barbeque turning frequently

Chicken Skewers

  • 500 grams boneless chicken thigh fillets, cut into 2cm cubes
  • 2 tablespoons Tandoor Paste
  • 200mls coconut milk (or 200mls thick natural yoghurt)
  • juice of half a lemon
  • 1 clove of garlic, minced
  • 1 chilli, deseeded and chopped
  • 1/4 cup coriander leaves

Method
  1. Pop all of the ingredients except the chicken into a food processor and blitz until well combined.
  2. Marinate the chicken for at least an hour or overnight
  3. Thread onto soaked skewers and grill for 10 minutes, turning frequently

Red Curry Fish Cakes

/

I love Asian food - just in case you hadn't noticed. I love Asian flavours - crisp, fresh, fragrant and clean. I don't take a bite of a SE Asian dish and have to think and analyse what 20 odd ingredients have gone into my mouthful. One of the reasons I love Thai food is it's pure simplicity, and the combination of flavours are traditional and make sense...

ingredients that grow together - go together!

I catered a friends birthday party recently and these Thai fish cakes barely made it out of the kitchen, teamed with a tomato chile jam, they were a hit. They also make a fabulous midweek dinner combined with a simple salad.

For my Doha friends, Thai Basil is available at Megamart, they get their Asian vegetables in on a Thursda, so Friday is a great time to shop. It's sold by weight, so don't be afraid to to open the bag and pull out a small handful of leaves.

Thai Fish Cakes

Use the freshest fish you can in this, and change around the flavours to suit what you have and what you like.The fishcakes are moderately (popularly) spicy, if you like extra spice, add in some chopped chile.

  • 500 grams firm boneless white fish, chopped into bite sized pieces
  • 2 teaspoons red curry paste
  • 1 teaspoon cornflour
  • 2 spring onions, chopped finely
  • 1/4 cup thai basil chopped finely
  • 1/4 cup coriander leaves, chopped finely
  • 1 clove garlic, chopped finely
  • 1/3 cup coconut milk
  • juice of half a lime
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • oil for shallow frying, or a spray of oil to bake in the oven



Method
  1. Combine the ingredients in a food processor and pulse until the ingredients come together but you can still see lovely lumps of fish. Alternatively, chop fish finely and combine with the rest of the ingredients.
  2. Form the mixture into 3cm balls - the mixture will be sticky, so use wet hands to form the mixture into balls. Flatten.
  3. Either cook in an oven at 400 degrees fahrenheit (200 degrees celcius) for 10 minutes, turning once during cooking, or heat 1cm vegetable oil in a frying pan on moderate heat, and fry the fishcakes for 2 minutes, then turn over and fry for 2 minutes more.
  4. Drain and serve.

Pad Thai

/
One of my favourite weekday meals is Pad Thai  (actually its one of my favourite meals any day of the week) - google it and you'll find a plethora of recipes. A good pad thai can be cooked in 5 minutes, and is the just the right heavenly mix of salty (from the fish sauce), sweet (from the sugar), spicy (from the chillies) and sour (from the tamarind and lime). 
 
Before you start to cook the pad thai, have everything chopped and ready to go. I like to keep my pad thai simple and I only ever cook one or two servings at a time, so that the wok stays really hot. I made the pad thai sauce earlier this week and popped into a big jar in the fridge, and it will keep for a few months - though never that long in my house, as I use it up fairly quickly.  I like prawns in my pad thai, but I also find it great for using up leftovers, so will pop shredded cooked chicken, and random vegetables in there (particularly for the kids). One of my biggest gripes about stirfrying is that the pan has to be so hot, the garlic and shallots can burn and become bitter, so here's a quick tip, pop the garlic and shallots into cold oil and then put the pan on to heat - as the oil heats, the garlic and onion will infuse flavour into it without burning.
 
 
 
Pad Thai
Serves 2 
 
Pad thai sauce
  • 1/2 cup tamarind concentrate (the runny stuff in a jar)
  • 1/2 cup palm sugar
  • 1/4 cup fish sauce
 
Pop tamarind sauce, palm sugar and fish sauce into a pot and heat over medium heat, stirring, until sugar has dissolved. Pop into the fridge.
  
  • 5 tablespoons pad thai sauce (or to taste, if you like it more saucy, pop more in)
  • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 shallot, or 1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
  • 1/2 teaspoon chile powder (or to taste)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2 cup chopped spring onions
  • 1/2 cup beansprouts
  • 200 grams prawns, peeled and deveined
  • 200 grams rice noodles
  • chopped peanuts
  • 1 lime, halved
  • coriander to garnish (not traditional, but yum)
  • chopped chillies to garnish
 
Method
  1. Soak the rice noodles in warm (not hot) water for 10 - 15 minutes. You're looking for the rice noodles to free up, but still be fairly firm. It's better to undersoak then oversoak, as you can add water to the wok to cook the noodles more if needed
  2. Put oil, garlic and shallots into a cold wok, or pan, and heat to a high heat. When the garlic starts to sizzle, add the drained noodles, pad thai sauce, chile powder and prawns
  3. Stir constantly over a high heat for a few minutes until noodles soften and prawns are cooked.
  4. Push noodles to the side and break in the eggs, scramble with the stirrer and when almost cooked, pop the noodles on top of the egg to finish off the cooking (about 1 to 2 minutes)
  5. Add beansprouts and spring onions and stir for another minute, serve with a squeeze of lime, and garnish with peanuts, coriander and chopped chillies.