Yesterday, the guy and I took a day off to listen in to the Primary one school orientation session arranged by the school for the parents and kiddos via Zoom. The entire session took almost two hours to listen in, and it was difficult to stay alert and awake for the entire time on an online forum. The boy gave up almost 15 minutes into the session and fell asleep at the tail end of it. It’s quite dry and rather unhelpful, unfortunately. I wish, again, that Covid wasn’t here and we could actually have the session in the school itself.
To end off the day in a better way, we went out for dinner, making use of the current, slightly more relaxed, Covid constraints where up to five pax in a household could dine out together. We had a reservation at the Tori-Tama, along Robertson Quay, and had our fill of many many sticks of grilled chicken parts as well as the range of Sake there. It was great, a lovely evening – one to remember in many years to come. Definitely going back again next time. But not too many times too because it was expensive! @@
November is coming to an end soon, and there is only so much time left to bake and cook what I hope to before 2022. There are some recipes which I have tried before when I was younger, and which are therefore not captured in this blog because it was too long ago. This particular one – stuffed prawns in wanton skin – was something I attempted back in my university days (almost twenty years ago!) because I wanted to impress someone (erhem) and so tried to make these at home to pack them to university for his lunch. I can’t really remember what his reaction was though (haha), just that it didn’t look as nice as these ones I just made, and that he had to finish them anyway. Those were the days…
Make sure to eat these prawns right out of the pan, while they are still crispy and piping hot. These stuffed prawns are really delicious, and can disappear very quickly without anyone noticing it!
Ingredients:
- Large prawn: 12, deshelled & deveined, leaving tails intact
- Prawn meat: 150g (minced)
- Spring onion: 4 stalks, finely chopped
- Pork fat: 25g, finely chopped
- Egg white: 1
- Cornflour: 3 tsp + 1/2 cup
- Salt: a pinch
- Ground white pepper: a pinch
- Egg: 1, lightly beaten
- Wanton skin: 20, sliced thinly
- Oil: for deep-frying
- Mayonnaise: for serving
Method:
- Using a knife, cut a shallow incision along the inside of the prawns.
- Combine prawn meat, spring onions & pork fat in a blender. Blend till smooth.
- Add in egg white, 3 tsp cornflour, salt & white pepper. Mix well.
- Using a knife, spread 1 tbsp mixture along prawn incision, pressing with wet hands.
- Coat in 1/2 cup cornflour, then lightly dip in beaten egg and press with wanton shreds.
- Heat oil (3-4cm) in wok. Deep-fry prawns for 1-2min on each side till golden brown.
- Drain on paper towels. Serve hot with mayonnaise.
Disclaimers:
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This recipe was kindly adapted from Periplus Mini Cookbooks’ ‘Yum Cha & Asian Treats’.
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I was unable to get the large-sized prawns and so got the medium-sized ones instead. Wasn’t able to stuff too much into the incision, but the smaller treats worked well for a small family like mine and we didn’t have too much wastage at the end of the meal 🙂
Tricks:
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To get a small amount of pork fat, buy some pork belly and trim off the fats from these bellies. You can store/freeze the pork bellies for use in other dishes too.
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This recipe cleverly uses wanton skin shreds in place of breadcrumbs as the final coat to make the prawn fritters crispy. It’s definitely a good way to make use of any wanton skin leftovers!
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Coat the stuffing well with cornflour at step 5 above as it helps to stick the prawn mixture to the prawns such that they don’t separate from the prawns while deep-frying.
Serving:
12 medium-sized prawn fritters