Kung chae nampla

Raw marine prawns butterflied and dressed to order, with the sauce made before they are cut.

Shellfish. Not vegetarian — contains fish sauce, shellfish.

Ingredients

• 500 g very fresh raw prawns, shelled
• 4 tablespoons fish sauce
• 4 tablespoons lime juice
• 2 tablespoons palm sugar
• 10 bird's eye chillies
• 8 garlic cloves
• 1 head garlic, sliced raw, to serve
• 1 bunch mint
• 1 bitter melon, sliced thin

Method

1. MARINE PRAWNS ONLY, AND AS FRESH AS YOU CAN BUY. This is eaten raw. Sea prawns do not carry the liver fluke that raw freshwater fish in this region does, which is why this dish is on the site and koi pla is not -- a different risk, not a smaller version of the same one. If you cannot buy prawns you would be happy to eat raw, do not make it.
2. Freeze them at minus 20C for 24 hours first if there is any doubt, and thaw in the fridge.
3. MAKE THE SAUCE BEFORE THE PRAWNS ARE CUT. Once they are butterflied they begin to cure in minutes, and the dish is meant to be assembled and eaten immediately.
4. Pound the garlic and chillies to a rough paste, then stir in the fish sauce, lime juice and palm sugar until the sugar has dissolved.
5. Taste it on its own: aggressively salty, sharply sour, fiercely hot. It is dressing raw sweet prawn and a polite sauce disappears against it.
6. Shell the prawns, leaving the tail, and slit each down the back without cutting through. Lift the vein out and press them open flat.
7. Rinse in iced water and pat completely dry.
8. Arrange cut side up on a cold plate, over the sliced bitter melon.
9. Sauce spooned over AT THE TABLE, not in the kitchen. Left to sit, the lime cures the flesh opaque and it becomes a ceviche -- a different thing, and not what this is.
10. Raw garlic slices and mint on top. Eat at once.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Thailand · All recipes