Make this Simple Yet Delicious Prawn Curry at Home

Indians have a great knack for cooking shrimps, prawns, lobsters and crabs in a way that is unknown to the rest of the world. There is almost nil use of wine, cheese or cream. Unlike the Thai, there is no use of galangal, Kafir lime leaves or lemon grass. There may be some use of the soya sauce in the North-Eastern India but in general mustard will be ubiquitous in the East-Indian preparations, garam masala in North Indian and curry leaves, black mustard seeds and coconut milk in South Indian recipes.

While preparing prawns, Indians will de-vein them alright, but generally retain their head and tail as these are believed to enhance the taste of the final dish. These will have to be discarded, with your bare hands, just before you sink your teeth into them, which makes eating prawns a very delicious but messy exercise. Your cutlery will often prove to be quite useless in such a situation!

Today I am going to share with you one such recipe. This recipe is popularly known as “Jhinga Curry” or Prawns cooked in a light curry. This prawn curry is made in most homes in West Bengal. This recipe uses a little bit of garam masala but no pachphoran (mixture of five spices) that most other fish dishes from Bengal use.

Serves 3-4

Ingredients

Prawns- 500 grams (18oz) (roughly 2 cups)

 Note: If frozen, please thaw the prawns first.

(Only de-shell the top portion and let the head portion remain with the shell. This adds a lot of taste to the curry)

Tomatoes -2 (to be made into a paste)

Onion-1 (chopped)

Garlic- 6 cloves

Ginger-1 inch

(Onion+ Garlic + Ginger to be made into a paste in a blender)

Salt–1 teaspoon (or to taste)

Sugar–1/4 teaspoon

Coriander powder–1 teaspoon

Garam Masala– 1/2 teaspoon

Tip: If you can’t get ready-made garam masala mixture from a nearby Indian store, you can make yours by using 1 black cardamom, 3 green cardamoms, 4 cloves, and 1 inch cinnamon-all ground together for this dish.

Turmeric (Haldi)–1 and 1/2 teaspoon (1 teaspoon for marinating the fish and half for the curry).

Red Chilli powder– 1/4 teaspoon (optional)

Fresh green chillies whole–4 (Whole chillies only impart a lovely flavour to the cuisine and will NOT make it spicy)

Mustard oil–3 tablespoon (If you want that classic taste, otherwise whatever oil you normally use)

Cumin seeds (Jeera)-1 teaspoon

Water-1 cup (roughly 300 ml)

Method

Sprinkle 1/2 teaspoon of salt and 1 teaspoon of turmeric on the prawns to coat it on all sides.

Heat 2 tablespoon of oil (the third tablespoon to be used for making the curry) in a non-stick pan and gently sauté the prawns till they change colour.

Remove to a plate and keep aside.

In a wok, add the oil left from frying (make sure the oil is clean) as well as the fresh third table spoon of oil.

Put the wok on your heat source.

As the oil heats up, add the cumin seeds and let it brown.

Do please make sure it does not burn.

Add onion+ garlic + ginger paste and stir well.

Add the salt, turmeric powder, coriander powder, red chilli powder, garam masala and sugar.

Keep on stirring till the paste is fried and you can see the oil glistening on the sides of the wok.

Add the tomato paste and stir well till the tomato is cooked.

Add 1 cup of water.

Add the sautéed prawns to this mixture and also add the whole fresh green chillies.

When the mixture comes to a boil, reduce the heat to the minimum (SIM on a gas stove) and cook it for 2 more minutes.

That’s all. Your classic Jhinga Curry (Prawn Curry) is ready.

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 10 minutes

Total time: 15 minutes

(This is an excerpt from my e-Book “The Ultimate Guide to Cooking Fish the Indian Way” which is available at a bargain PRE-ORDER price of US $0.99 (or equivalent) on all major e-book platforms (such as Amazon, Apple iBook’s store, Nook, Kobo, Scribd and Google Play) only till 31 May 2015. Prices shall go up to US $4.99 thereafter. The paperback version is already published.

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