The finished spicy, yummy Laksa
After the Indian Banquet debacle (bread like wood, one recipe didn’t even get to, another as sweet as jam), I decided to keep it simple(r). So I plumped for a tried and tested recipe from my favourite cook of all time Rick Stein. It’s a seafood Laksa; a cross between a spicy soup and a curry. It’s simple, it’s delicious and I picked it as a confidence booster for my dented ego.
There are only three steps. The first is the stock and it’s made all the more flavoursome by first frying the prawn heads and shells, adding stock and letting it simmer for 10 minutes or so. Strain the liquid and set aside. Dead easy.
Fry the prawn shells
Then you make the paste. Roughly chop (see exact amounts below) dried & fresh chillies, cashew nuts, lemongrass stalks, garlic, galangal or ginger, and shallots to a hand blender or pestle and mortar. Add turmeric powder, shrimp paste and a couple of tablespoons of water. Blend to a paste. Fry the paste in oil until fragrant (about 5-6 minutes) add the strained stock and simmer for 10 minutes.
Fry paste until fragrant
Then finally add the coconut milk, prawns, squid, fish sauce and sugar. Cook until the seafood is tender.
Add cooked noodles and beansprouts to the bottom of noodle bowls, pour over the laksa sauce and garnish with coriander, mint, chopped chillies, spring onions and batons of cucumber. Voila. This has to be one of my favourite dishes because it is easy and very tasty. Serve with ice cold beer or Pinot Grigio.
The recipe
250g raw unpeeled prawns
Vegetable oil, for shallow and deep-frying
400ml coconut milk
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp palm or light brown muscovado sugar
300g dried rice vermicelli noodles
100g beansprouts
3 spring onions, trimmed and thinly sliced on the diagonal
A handful of mixed mint and coriander leaves
Salt
The paste
3 dried red kashmiri chillies, split open and the seeds shaken out
2 medium-hot fresh red chillies, deseeded and roughly chopped
20g nuts (macadamia, unsalted peanuts or cashew nuts)
2 stalks lemongrass, core chopped
3 fat garlic cloves
3cm piece peeled galangal or ginger, roughly chopped
1 tsp turmeric powder
75g shallots, roughly chopped
2 tsp blachan (shrimp paste)
1 tbsp vegetable oil
February 16, 2012 at 7:42 pm
Sounds delicious – I love those Malay flavours. There was a Malayan/Singapore restaurant near my studio when I lived in London, and Laksa was a regular lunch.
February 17, 2012 at 6:50 am
Laksa for lunch – not the tidiest of lunches to have. A colleague at work used to have Laksa and to protect his shirt would tuck a bin liner as if a very large napkin. Bit of an odd sight in the office.
February 18, 2012 at 1:59 am
Andy these photographs turned out wonderful. Your recipe of course is one of my favorite soups during these winter months as I love the heat and the calming of the coconut milk.
February 18, 2012 at 7:16 am
Thanks Bam! Needed a recipe to get my confidence back!
February 18, 2012 at 9:15 pm
Gorgeous – I love Rick Stein´s style of cooking and this recipe looks so straighforward! Love the photos by the way :)
February 18, 2012 at 9:21 pm
Thank you. Yes it’s definitely straightforward. Needed something like this to get my mojo back.
February 19, 2012 at 5:15 pm
Looks delicious. I made prawn har mee last night which was fab. Nothing like stir frying the prawn shells to get the flavour really going.
February 19, 2012 at 7:29 pm
Can you give me the recipe?
February 19, 2012 at 8:08 pm
Yep, I used this one that I found online http://www.mysimplefood.com/2010/06/ultimate-prawn-mee-mee-yoke-har-mee.html
I compared a few and this seemed to be the best of the bunch. The one on Lifestyle Food also looked good though. http://www.lifestylefood.com.au/recipes/12857/prawn-noodle-soup-or-har-mee
February 21, 2012 at 8:00 pm
Reckon you might like this blog
http://shizuokagourmet.com/
March 5, 2012 at 7:02 pm
Great minds think alike, I was looking at Rick Stein’s laksa recipe the other day, and had decided to make a veggie one, but your fish one does soung very tempting
March 5, 2012 at 7:05 pm
You can’t go with the seafood laksa. It’s fab. How was the veggie version?
June 28, 2012 at 8:28 pm
I love this this! Love it a little spicy too!
Bea
June 28, 2012 at 8:51 pm
Thank you! And thanks for dropping by.
July 16, 2012 at 1:37 pm
I love Laksa, and for some reason haven’t made it for ages. Reading your post has inspired me to return to the recipe! Also, thanks for stopping by my blog– I lived in Japan for a while and have a few Japanese recipes up my sleeve that I hope to be posting soon!
July 16, 2012 at 3:23 pm
That’s great. Glad it’s reminded you to cook it again. It’s one of my favourite – straight forward to do but dead yummy.
Thanks for dropping by!
Looking forward to reading more of your blog.
Andy
July 17, 2012 at 8:53 am
Hi
I’m really looking forward to seeing a Japanese recipes. I love Asian, love Japan, but haven’t cooked a lot of Japanese food (apart from curry udon, which isn’t really cooking, it’s using the Japanese curry sauce! Still yum though).
July 18, 2012 at 1:55 am
Yes, I love Japanese curry rice, though it’s about the same level of (not)cooking for that, too! Looking forward to sharing recipes with you
July 18, 2012 at 9:37 am
Can’t wait!
July 18, 2012 at 9:38 am
Where in Japan do you live? My friends have just moved back to Tokyo. I have been once, Tokyo and nazawa onsen. Lovely