Prawns in spicy sesame sauce

We’re off to a jousting tournament in a minute (holidays!), so here’s a quick run-through of a dish I made at the end of June. For the first time I used something ready-made to cook prawns: a bottle of chilli and sesame sauce. I’ll freely admit I was improvising, of course. The original plan was a little sauce based on coconut milk and butter, but things evolved as I cooked.

In the end the dish went down well. I have to say it got quite a few compliments, even. So it’s probably worth it. It’s certainly worth trying things out.

Prawns in hot sauce done this way are just the thing for the evening, preferably with a well-chilled dry white wine. Perfect for a holiday day like the one today promises to be. Mine even comes with a jousting tournament 🙂 So I’m off. Do try making these yourselves.

At a glance: 

Prep time: 45 minutes

Serves: 4

Calories: prawns and wine, and everyone forgets about calories

Ingredients for spicy prawns:

• 1 kg frozen cooked black tiger prawns (mine were size 20 / 30)
• half a small bottle of hot chilli and sesame sauce
• a small tin of coconut milk
• 2 garlic cloves
• half a block of butter
• a glass of dry white Sauvignon Blanc
• salt
• ground black pepper

Method (chill some dry white wine while you cook, you’ll want it to go with the prawns):

I thawed the prawns by covering them with hot water for 2–3 minutes, then drained them in a colander.

I heated half a block of butter in a frying pan and lightly fried the finely chopped garlic (literally 20 seconds). I tipped in the prawns, added pepper to taste and fried them for a few minutes, stirring occasionally. After a few minutes I poured in a glass of wine.

Once the wine had nearly evaporated, I poured a small tin of coconut milk into the pan. I salted it to taste and gave it a good stir.

I kept cooking it over a low “flame” (4 on my scale of 1 to 10). Once the milk and wine had formed a moderately thick sauce (after about 10 minutes), I poured half a bottle of hot chilli and sesame sauce into the pan. I cooked it for about another 4–5 minutes, stirring almost constantly. That’s it. I served it with a fresh baguette and white wine. Enjoy!