Asian-style prawn cocktail

• By Nick Camilleri Preziosi and Alex Mattei

The prawn cocktail may have come to be seen as a left-over cliché from 1970s dinner parties and restaurant menus, made with frozen prawns and limp lettuce, but this one is very different. Today’s Australian cuisine involves the mixing of completely different ethnic traditions. Potent Asian flavours such as lemon grass, coriander, chilli, and cardamom can be blended into many European dishes. This is the Australian take on the classic prawn cocktail.

For 6 people, you will need:

36 medium-sized prawns (blanched for two minutes, then peeled and de-veined), 200ml of coconut milk, two tablespoonfuls of mayonnaise, the juice and zest of one lime, six lime quarters for the garnish, two tablespoonfuls of coriander (finely chopped), six coriander leaves for the garnish, two spring onions, a 1cm cube of fresh ginger (peeled and minced), one clove of garlic (peeled and minced), two teaspoonfuls of fish sauce , one teaspoonful of sriracha (Thai chilli sauce), one iceberg lettuce (thinly sliced).

Mix all the ingredients together, except for the lettuce, and refrigerate this for two hours. In six chilled cocktail glasses, make alternating layers of lettuce and prawn mix (two prawns per layer) and garnish the glass with lime and a coriander leaf. Serve this immediately.