[Vietnamese Recipes] Vietnamese Mussels & Prawns in Coconut

I’m excited to have a few good posts in store for you, includ­ing this Viet­namese Mus­sels &Prawns in Coconut Broth. I’ve been busy — between the tax sea­son, being away, get­ting sick and every­thing in between, I still cooked up a storm, but saved the plea­sure of writ­ing for a quiet day like this one. Spring is almost here, I think, and that’s pretty excit­ing for a part of the world that sees 5 months of win­ter. By this time of the year, every­one is qui­etly sick of the snow and pray­ing for some warm rays of sun­shine. Fin­gers crossed.

So last week, I had the good for­tune of stum­bling upon this quick and awe­some mus­sel (awesome-​mussel!) recipe. This is the sort of thing that started this blog — we absolutely loved it, adapted it to our own cook­ing style and needed to remem­ber how to make it.

This dish uses coconut juice as the broth — its first boiled on its own and infused with gin­ger, red Thai chilies and gar­lic. It’s later strained and fur­ther cooked in a wok with yet more chilies, gar­lic and the seafood. The fla­vor made me raise my eye­brows — I enjoyed the seafood, but I was really sur­prised by how deli­cious the sauce turned out to be. Be warned, it’s hot — a punch in the face of bold fla­vor, but a pleas­ant punch

If you don’t have access to all the herbs called for in this recipe, sim­ply use the basil and cilantro. But it’s worth­while to inves­ti­gate local mar­kets — these herbs really lift the dish with their aroma and fresh­ness, plus they’re extremely healthy.

Tip:

The mus­sels must either be impec­ca­bly fresh, or don’t use them at all. Because we’re land-​locked and fresh mus­sels are usu­ally a gam­ble, I started buy­ing them frozen on the half-​shell. I let them defrost in the fridge overnight, or put them in a plas­tic bag and run cold water over them in the sink.

Let’s make this:
Viet­namese Mus­sels & Prawns in Coconut Broth

Author: Aleks
Recipe type: Main Course
Cui­sine: Viet­namese
Serves: 4

Ingre­di­ents

1½ table­spoons grape­seed oil, or other low smoke-​point oil
1 clove gar­lic, finely minced
1 clove shal­lot, or scal­lions — white parts only, finely minced
3 red Thai chilies, finely chopped
1 lb mus­sels (washed and bearded), whole, or on the half shell
12 – 16 tiger prawns, shelled and deveined
Viet­namese Herbs (Leaves Only)
6 stalks of Thai basil
2 stalks of saw­tooth coriander
1 stalk of perilla
3 stalks of peppermint
2 stalks of rice paddy herb
cilantro, to garnish

For the broth:

3 cups of coconut juice
½ inch gin­ger (lightly pounded)
1 inch kachai rhi­zome, finely chopped (optional)
1 lemon­grass stalk, trimmed, and finely chopped
3 red Thai chilies (smashed)
½ tea­spoon lime zest
1 tea­spoon lime juice
½ tea­spoon fish sauce

Instruc­tions

1. Add all ingre­di­ents to a small stock­pot and bring to a boil over high heat. Sim­mer for 5 min­utes, remove from heat and let rest for at least 15 min­utes, then strain the broth and set it aside. Dis­card the strained ingredients.

2. Heat a wok until almost smok­ing, then add the prawns, quickly dis­trib­ut­ing them evenly so each touches the wok directly. Don’t turn over. Let cook on one side for about a minute — and turn over when no longer opaque. Remove from the wok when done and set aside.

3. Turn down the heat the wok to medium-​high and add the oil, let it heat up for a moment, then add the minced gar­lic, shal­lots and chilies. Stir fry until lightly browned, then increase the heat to high and pour in the broth. Mix well, the broth should be boil­ing and bub­bling now. Add the mus­sels and herbs and cook, cov­ered, for 3 min­utes. (If you’re using fresh mus­sels, cook until all mus­sels are open).

4. Remove the cover, turn off the heat. Add the prawns to the broth and pour over the sauce.

5. Serve with rice and gar­nish with cilantro.

This recipe and image sources are referred in website: Canuckcuisine.com. Thanks so much!