Tony Jackman’s prawns with pennoni lisci. (Photo: Tony Jackman) I’ve been eyeing the pennoni lisci at my local Checkers for some time. Large tubes of jet-black pasta from Puglia, made with cuttlefish ink. I’ve eaten cuttlefish – the actual fish – and it is utterly delicious. Like large calamari but with more intense flavour.
I had already bought a packet of what is rather gloomily called “prawn meat”. Which in fact is perfectly proper prawn tails without shells. “Prawn meat” seems to suggest that it’s some kind of processed alternative, but not so. I don’t know why they can’t just call them shelled prawn tails.
Now, I need to explain something about the forthcoming recipe and that image above. You’ll see that it is relatively free of sauce. This is because I intentionally omitted the coconut cream for our supper this week, but I do recommend you use it and add it to the mix.
Also in the recipe are red spring onions (often called salad onions but that’s only because they sell them with the lettuce), sugar snap peas, red bell pepper, and orange sweet pepper, and I used white wine to deglaze the pan after cooking the prawns and vegetables. I finished the dish with fresh coriander, both in the dish and on top when serving.
Ingredients
1 packet of pennoni lisci pasta tubes (I bought them from Checkers under their Forage and Feast brand)
1 400g packet of frozen prawn meat, thawed and drained
Coconut oil, as needed
6 red spring onions
16 sugar snap peas
½ a red bell pepper
1 orange sweet pepper
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
1 red chilli (optional), finely chopped
A glass of white wine
1 x 400g can coconut cream (optional)
Fresh coriander
1 ladle of squid ink pasta water
Salt
Black pepper
Method
Chop the spring onions, pull the strings off the sugar snap peas, and slice the peppers into narrow strips.
Boil a pot of water, salt it lightly, and add the pasta all at once. Stir immediately with a wooden spoon or spatula to ensure the tubes don’t stick together. Boil briskly, but not at full tilt, until al dente. This took about 20 minutes as this pasta is pretty dense. Drain.
Meanwhile, heat some coconut oil in a pan and cook the (drained and patted-dry) prawns in batches and transfer to a bowl.
Add more coconut oil and fry off, in turn, the red spring onions, sugar snap peas, red bell pepper, and orange sweet pepper. Add the garlic and chilli, stir for a minute, and turn off the heat. Season with salt and black pepper as you go. Remove to the side bowl.
Add the white wine to the pan and deglaze, stirring. Let the wine cook away by two-thirds. Add a ladle of squid ink pasta water and stir it in. Let it simmer for 2 or 3 minutes.
If using coconut cream, stir it in now and reduce by half.
Add the prawns and vegetables back to the pan and heat through gently, while stirring. Add half of the chopped coriander and give it a stir.
Spoon pasta tubes onto plates and spoon the prawns and vegetables and their sauce on top.
Garnish with chopped fresh coriander. DM
Tony Jackman is twice winner of the Galliova Food Writer of the Year award.
Follow Tony Jackman on Instagram @tony_jackman_cooks.