Prawn and white wine spaghetti
Recipe by Ollie Tarrant
This is an absolute staple of my cooking repertoire. I’ve tried to pick something for you that’s still luxurious enough to impress the family, without requiring a labyrinthine concoction of strange ingredients.
This is a deliciously well balanced dish; the sweet and tangy pop of the tomatoes peppers the rich silk of butter and oil; the heat of the garlic serves as a sensational casing around the sweet centre of the king prawns. It’s the ideal dish to dazzle your loved ones with in lockdown, so here’s how to make it.
Ingredients (serves 4):
- 500g spaghetti (linguini also works well)
- 250g large prawns
- 2 fat cloves of garlic, finely sliced
- 200g cherry tomatoes
- Zest and juice of 1 lemon
- 1/2 teaspoon of chilli flakes
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- Large knob of butter
- 150ml white wine
- Handful of parsley
- Salt and pepper
I hope you like this recipe and have the ingredients handy to give it a go. If you do make this one, tag me on Instagram @OTCooks_Eats — I’d love to see how you get on with it!
Method:
- Bring a large saucepan of water up to the boil. Season heavily with salt. Once it’s boiling, add the pasta. Twist it so that it doesn’t stick together, and bring back up to a rolling boil. Cook according to timings on packet instructions, or slightly under the recommended time should you want it al-dente.
- In a large frying pan, while cold place the butter and olive oil and add the garlic and chilli flakes in. Bring the pan up to a high heat (by starting from cold, you are infusing the oil slightly).
- Once the garlic starts to become fragrant, but not quite brown yet, add in the washed cherry tomatoes. Coat them in the sauce, then once the garlic just starts to go golden, add in the wine. This should stop the frying process and prevent the garlic from overcooking and going bitter. Add in the prawns at this stage and let the liquid reduce.
- Once the pasta is almost ready, lift it straight from the pan into the sauce with a pair of tongs. Don’t worry if some of the pasta water comes with it, this is exactly what we want. The salty/starchy pasta water will emulsify with the oil and make a luxuriously light sauce.
- Once all the pasta is in the sauce, add in the lemon zest, half of the juice and the parsley. Mix thoroughly to combine it all, and taste for seasoning. Add salt/pepper/lemon juice accordingly. Dress it with 1 final swig of olive oil, give it 1 final mix through.
- To serve, use the tongs, and try to get as much height in the pile of pasta as possible. Serve with some homemade foccacia if you’ve got got the time and ingredients to prepare it.
- Enjoy!
FEMME FATALES 