Prawn, basil and chilli stir fry

Prawns are a favourite seafood at home. We'd have prawns if not once a week, at least twice a month. A common recipe is garlic butter prawns, like the classic Spanish Gambas al Ajillo minus the chillies, olive oil and parsley, and prawn pasta - a recipe shared by the wife of my former boss R, which I will post soon.

This recipe is almost Thai in feature, like this recipe here but I'm most certain the magazine feature was for contemporary Australian cuisine. Australia after all, is a myriad of cultures and tradition. As multicultural as the variety of food and dishes available - fusion, is the right word.

I got this recipe from the November 2007 issue of Real Living Magazine.

Since we're sick of the usual garlic buttered prawn in our menu, I thought it would be a good time (its a new year!) to try on new prawn recipes. This recipe is simple and fast, even Daddy can do it. That is, if he actually wants to have a go.

Serves 4
Prep time 10 minutes Cooking time 20 minutes Ingredients 2 tbsp sunflower oil (I used whatever I had on hand - vegetable oil)

Ingredients:

500g peeled green prawn, tails on

250g sugar snap/snow peas, trimmed

2 large garlic cloves, crushed

3 tbsp sweet chili sauce

2 tbsp fish sauce

2 tbsp light soy sauce

1/3 cup cold water

1/2 cup fresh Thai basil leaves


Method

Heat oil in wok (or frying pan) over medium heat

Stir fry prawns for 2 minutes.

Add sugar snaps and stir fry for further 1 minute

Using slotted spoon, remove prawns and sugar snaps from pan and put on plate

Reduce heat and add garlic to pan.

Fry for 10 seconds, then add sweet chili, fish sauce,soy sauce and 1/3 cup cold water

Bring to a boil and simmer for 2-3 minutes until thickened

Return prawns and snap peas to pan and heat through for 1 minute.

Sprinkle over basil leaves and serve with rice

This turned out lovely with rice. The chilli sauce added the bite, and the basil topping was a great addition to the fusion of the sweetness and spice of the dish.

My Christmas challenge - Devil's Food White Out Cake

My first post for the year, and after a long while actually and I'm giddy with excitement!!!

Several months ago, I posted this dream cake by Dorie Greenspan from her book - From My Home to Yours and at that time, just the thought of making the cake was enough to make my head spin.

But dreams are meant to be fulfilled, goals are meant to be reached, and challenges taken, otherwise it'll all be so extraordinarily boring. And so, the challenge to prepare it on a special occasion came and I did it! Despite not having same kind of visual result and spectacle as the one featured in DG's book, the absence of a candy thermometer for the icing and filling, and having the icing droop on the cake like melting snow on the alps, I must say, the cake did turn out quite surprisingly good!

While the name of this recipe did not seem apt for the season (Devil's Food White-Out Cake on Christmas!!!!), the cake was absolutely heavenly. Dorie Greenspan is an angel for coming up with this recipe.

And while I didn't have the book in my possession at the time, I found it conveniently posted in this site here.