Malaysian Butter Prawns

Malaysian Butter Prawns is one of my favourite local Malaysian seafood dish. You may have already heard of Cereal prawns or Nestum prawns, well it's kind of same same but different! I don't like cereal of any kind! Blergh! But this, I like.. it's very shiok!

I adapted my cooking to the recipe from http://www.smokywok.com/2008/10/malaysian-butter-prawns-recipe.html

The preparation time took the longest as I had to devein the prawns without removing the shell. And I forgot to remove the eyes.. but that's okay, because I don't eat the prawn heads anyway.

Ingredients:

15 head-on prawns, shell on - deveined and remove eyes (whoops! I forgot the eyes!)
A handful of fresh curry leaves
3 tbsps butter
3 egg yolks
3 cloves garlic, minced finely
4-5 bird's eye chilli peppers, seeded and finely chopped
1 tsp salt
Dash of tumeric
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp sugar
Dash of Shaoxing Wine (Chinese Rice Wine)
Dash of white pepper
1 red onion
1 pinch of black pepper

Method:

Firstly, clean and devein prawns. Use kitchen scissors to cut shell to remove veins. Marinate in tumeric, add a pinch of salt and pepper. Coat prawns in rice flour.

Heat enough oil to deep fry the prawns. Fry in the hot oil until shells turn red and looked crunchy. Remove and drain, set aside.

Next, use about 2 tbsps of the oil used earlier in your wok. Briskly fry the garlic, chilli peppers curry leaves and salt until fragrant. Turn heat to medium-low, add the butter.

Next, add the egg yolks, squeezing through a perforated spoon and finally add the prawns that were fried earlier. Add more salt if desired at this point. Stir-around to coat prawns with the butter sauce. Serve hot.

And there you have it, Butter prawns, not for the faint hearted! Seriously yummo!

Taiyaki, fish shaped snacks

I love these Taiyaki snacks, often, you can see these selling like hot cakes in Japan or Korea. There are lots of fillings you can add in  yourTaiyaki, my favourite would be the red bean paste from the azuki beans. You can make the paste yourself or buy a can from your Asian Grocer. Here are some options for taiyaki if you do decide to make some one day.

• Nutella
• Black sesame paste
• Red bean paste
• Peanut butter and jelly ( for the western taste)
• Custard, normal or pandan
• Durian paste
• Sweet potato paste
• Yams

The choices are endless, it's really up to your own individual taste and imagination. Recipe adapted from http://www.justonecookbook.com/taiyaki/

Ingredients:

150 g (about 1¼ cup) cake flour (minus 2Tbsp flour and add 2 Tbsp cornflour)
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 egg, beaten
200 ml (about ¾ cup) milk
3 Tbsp. granulated sugar
100 g azuki red bean paste, I bought a can from asian grocer
1 Tbsp. vegetable oil

Method:

1. Combine the flour and baking soda and mix together with a whisk. Add sugar and mix again. 
2. Form the azuki red bean paste into long thin shapes about the size of your taiyaki mould
3. Beat eggs, add the milk, mix well, then add into the dry ingredients a little at a time and mix gently putting the batter through the gaps of the whisk. Mix the batter gently.
4. Wrap the mixture in cling film and put it in the fridge to rest for 1 hour
5. Grease the taiyaki pan lightly with oil and warm it up. Fill the pan halfway up with batter.
6. Add the sweet red bean paste on top
7. Pour more batter over the top to cover the beans. Close the lid of the pan and cook for 3-5 minutes until golden. They're ready to eat whilst they're still hot.