Appetizer

Prawn 65

Name: Prawn 65
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Indian
Ingredients: 500 g prawns, cleaned and deveined; 2 tbsp lemon juice; 1 tsp turmeric powder; 0.5 tsp coriander powder; 0.5 tbsp garam masala; 1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste; 1.5 tbsp red chilli powder; 2 tbsp cornflour; 0.5 tsp black pepper powder; 1 egg (use the white only) — for the marinade; 5 g fine sea salt (about 1% of the prawns); oil for deep frying; 0.5 tsp mustard seeds; 0.5 tsp cumin seeds; 8 curry leaves; 2 green chillies, finely chopped; 1 onion, finely chopped

Prawn 65 is one of those dishes that sounds like a recipe number but is actually South Indian street food shorthand for 'intensely marinated, deep-fried and then tossed with aromatics'. The prawn absorbs the chilli-ginger-garlic marinade overnight and comes out of the oil crackling and flavour-dense, then gets a second hit of heat from the curry leaf toss.

45 minServes 4 medium–hot

Method

Pat the prawns completely dry. Combine the lemon juice, turmeric, coriander powder, garam masala, ginger-garlic paste, chilli powder, cornflour, black pepper, egg white and salt in a bowl. Add the prawns and toss to coat. Marinate for 30 minutes in the fridge.
Heat oil for deep frying to 180 °C / 355 °F. No thermometer? A pinch of the coating dropped in should sizzle briskly and rise within about 2 seconds. Fry the prawns in batches, without crowding (which cools the oil and steams them), for 3–4 minutes until crisp and golden — they're cooked the moment they turn opaque and curl into a loose C. Drain on kitchen paper. Prawns overcook fast and go rubbery; pull them as soon as they're crisp rather than running the full time.
In a separate small pan, heat 1 tsp oil. Add the mustard seeds and cumin seeds and let them pop.
Add the chopped onion and green chillies and sauté until the onion turns light golden.
Add the curry leaves and fry for a further 30 seconds — stand back, they spit.
Toss the fried prawns into the pan, stir quickly to coat with the aromatics, and serve immediately with lemon wedges.

Cook's note. Do not overcook the prawns in the oil — they turn rubbery fast. Five to six minutes at medium-high heat is enough; they will continue cooking briefly in the hot toss pan.

The story

The '65' family of dishes traces back to the Buhari Hotel in Chennai in 1965, where Chicken 65 was supposedly the 65th item on the menu. Whether the legend is true hardly matters — the style of preparation (marinated, deep-fried, tossed with aromatics) proved so popular that it spawned endless variants. Prawn 65 arrived when the formula hit the coastal kitchens of Tamil Nadu and Kerala.