It’s an exciting day, I had my first round of ripe cherry tomatoes from the garden! There weren’t many yet but they make a good addition to this cucumber salad which is very refreshing and nicely balances out the crispy prawns. Which, by the way are sooo good, they kind of taste like popcorn shrimp, except that they are much healthier than the original which usually calls for larger quantities of nutrient devoid refined oil and a thick white flour based coating.
Crispy Prawns with Citrus Poppyseed Cucumber Salad
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Serves: 4
INGREDIENTS:
- Dressing
- 2 tablespoons cold-pressed olive oil
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 1½ teaspoons raw apple cider vinegar
- 1½ teaspoons stone ground mustard
- 1½ teaspoons poppy seeds
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- ½ teaspoon lemon zest
- Salad
- 2 cups cucumbers chopped finely
- ½ red bell pepper chopped finely
- ¼ cup black olives pitted and halved
- ¼ cup cherry tomatoes halved
- 3 tablespoons green onion chopped finely
- Prawns
- 24 prawns peeled and deveined
- ¼ cup cold-pressed coconut oil
- ¼ cup corn meal
- 1 egg
- 2 tablespoons quinoa uncooked
- 2 tablespoons sesame seeds
- 2 tablespoons corn starch
- 2 pinches sea salt
DIRECTIONS:
- Dressing
- Combine all the ingredients in a small glass jar or plastic container, cover tightly and shake vigorously until it is all mixed.
- Salad
- Toss all the ingredients and dressing in a mixing bowl and sit aside. You can leave it out if you want to serve at room temperature or refrigerate until the prawns are done.
- Prawns
- Set up 3 bowls to make the crunchy coating. The first bowl contains the cornstarch and salt, the second contains the egg beaten, and the third contains the corn meal, quinoa and sesame seeds. Put each prawn through the process, make sure it is fully but lightly coated in the cornstarch, then emmersed in the egg and finally coated with the corn meal mixture. Heat up a pan with the coconut oil over the stove on medium high heat. Using tongs place the prawns in the pan and flip after 2 minutes or until they start to brown lightly, then cook the reverse side for about 2 minutes. The crust can be fragile so get a firm hold on them with the tongs or else it may crumble off a bit. Make sure that the oil does not start to smoke, if so remove the pan from the element and turn down the heat. If the oil reaches its smoking point the flavor and nutrients start to deteriorate very quickly.
