Sautéed Prawns in Yuzu Sauce (柚子蜜煎大虾)

“Not much an appetite to eat? I have cooked these juicy shrimps with some tantalizing citrus sauce to whet your appetite.”

This recipe I saw in a TVB cooking show (created by a popular HK celebrity) represents an interesting variation on the conventional sweet & sour flavor of the prawn dishes. This recipe incorporates the rich and refreshing marmalade, and good thing is, you probably need not to purposely buy this ingredient for the dish, it might already been seating in your drink pantry all these while… What this recipe add is the Honeyed Yuzu (called it Yuja in Korean) marmalade that uses to make drinks.

Having not much an appetite recently, I was tempted to this out! The inclusion of the citrus injects the right amount of sweet sourish zesty taste to complement the dish’s many savory and aromatic flavours.

In any case if you do not have the Korean Yuzu marmalade, use the Japan Yuzu paste or even the syrup. Like I mentioned before, cooking is all about versatility. So, for even more flexibility to my cooking, I am not fussy about adapting orange marmalade (or simple the zesty orange jam) and honey for this. It works as well!

Ingredients
500 grams large prawns (about 10 – 12 prawns), trimmed legs and cut a slit at the back with shell remained, deveined, seasoned with pinch of salt and pepper

2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 red chili, chopped
1/2 stalk of lemon grass (香茅), chopped
1 teaspoon of fried shallot

3 tablespoons of Yuzu Honey (柚子蜜)
1 teaspoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
100 – 150 gram of chicken stock
Pinch of salt

2 – 3 tablespoons of cooking oil
2 – 3 knobs of butter (about ½ tablespoon/ knob)

Garnishing
Some chopped coriander

Method
1) Heat frying pan with 1 tablespoon of oil over medium-low fire. Melt 1 knob of butter. Slightly straighten the prawns before placing on the pan to sauté both sides till lightly browned. Sauté the prawns in batches. Simply replenish the fat and repeat step until all prawns are sautéed. Estimated to be done in 2 batches. Dish up and set aside.

2) Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in the pan over medium fire. Add in garlic, lemon grass and chili, stir fry till lightly browned and fragrant.

3) Reduce heat to low fire, melt the knob of butter. Then, add in Yuzu honey, followed by chicken stock. Stir to combine and simmer sauce till sizzling. Add in lemon juice. Sprinkle fried shallot and salt. Return prawns to the wok and stir fry to combine, for about 1 minute. Sauce will be thicken and reduced by then. Heat off and dish up. Garnish before serve.

1 serving of my Yuzu Saucy Prawn (2 large prawns) counts about 80kcal. To reduce calorie intake, do without the additon of butter.

Tips: Add more chicken stock, if more sauce preferred.
* There are many different forms of Yuzu product. Yuzu marmalade, paste or syrup works similarly well. Use of syrup yields wetter dish, reduce the addition of chicken stock or remain as it is, as your preference.
* Do not overcook the prawns to retain its moisture. If you are using less fat to sauté the prawns, what you could do is: When heat off, sprinkle a little bit of water on the prawns and cover pan with a lid to ‘steam’ a little while. The standing heat in the pan will help to cook the prawns slightly more. This way, the prawns will be pinked with moist.