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Bengali · Main

Chingri Malai Curry

  • Intermediate
  • 35 min
  • roughly 3 of 4 for cost

rich · warm-spiced · earthy · aromatic Leads with richness that coats and comforts, warm spice humming through the middle, opening aromatic and staying there.

Ingredients

  • 600g bagda chingri (tiger prawns), shell and head on
  • 1 tsp turmeric and 1.5 tsp salt, for the prawns
  • 60ml mustard oil
  • 2 bay leaves, 4 green cardamom, 5cm cassia bark, 4 cloves
  • 150g onion, ground to a smooth paste
  • 1 tbsp ginger paste
  • 1 tsp turmeric
  • 1 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder
  • 1 tbsp sugar
  • 250ml thin coconut milk
  • 150ml thick coconut milk
  • 4 kancha lonka (green chillies), slit
  • 1 tsp ghee
  • 0.5 tsp garam masala

The skills inside

Tempering a custardReducing a sauceSearing: the hard crustFrying the paste until the oil splits

Allergen screen

Found: dairy · shellfish · mustard

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

  1. Devein the prawns through the back, leaving the shell and head on, and rub them with the first lot of turmeric and salt.
  2. Heat the mustard oil until the raw pungency flattens, then sear the prawns 40 seconds a side, until they turn opaque coral and curl into a loose C. Lift them out while they are still slightly under.
  3. Temper the whole spices until the cardamom smells sweet, add the onion paste, and fry 10 minutes until the raw smell goes and the oil separates and runs orange at the edge. 10 min
  4. Stir in the ginger, turmeric, chilli powder and sugar with 2 tbsp water and fry 2 minutes, until the paste no longer smells of raw spice. 2 min
  5. Pour in the thin coconut milk and simmer gently 6 minutes until it coats a spoon, then add the thick coconut milk, the prawns and the chillies and hold the pan at a lazy shiver, never a boil, for 3 minutes. Finish off the heat with the ghee and garam masala. 6 min

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Tempering a custard 59 recipes

  • The hot liquid went into the eggs a little at a time with constant whisking, and only then did everything go back to the pot.
  • The heat under it stayed gentle throughout and it was never allowed to boil.
  • Stirred continuously and right into the corners of the pan, where it thickens first and sets unnoticed.
  • Judged by behaviour: it thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon and hold a clean line when a finger is drawn through it.
  • Taken off before it looks finished, and strained. Residual heat carries it the rest of the way, and a custard held on the heat until it looks right arrives past right.

Where it goes wrong The hot liquid went in too fast, or the pot went back over full heat to save time. The yolks set into threads before they could thicken smoothly, and a scrambled custard does not come back; straining hides a little of it and nothing hides the rest.

Reducing a sauce 95 recipes

  • A steady simmer with the surface moving, never a rolling boil that throws it up the sides and scorches what is left on the base.
  • Judged by behaviour rather than the clock: it coats the back of a spoon and holds a clean line when a finger is drawn through it.
  • The drop in volume is visible against the side of the pan: there is a line to see, not a guess about whether anything has happened.
  • Seasoned at the end and not the beginning, because salt concentrates at exactly the rate everything else does.
  • Nothing is catching underneath: a spoon drawn across the base comes up clean, with no browned film building where the heat is fiercest.

Where it goes wrong It was seasoned at the start and then reduced by half. The salt concentrated along with everything else, so the sauce reaches perfect body and is too salty to serve. And the only remedy is to dilute it and reduce it all over again.

At the Table

The Pour
Albariño
Also Right
Champagne
From the Taps
Pilsner or witbier
Zero-Proof
White grape & tonic

Shellfish sweetness meets acid, salinity, and bubbles, precision instruments for delicate meat.

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Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Chingri Malai Curry Technique: Tempering a custardThe skill inside this recipeTechnique: Reducing a sauceThe skill inside this recipe The cuisine, deeper Technique films from the Bengali kitchen