Flora Cuisine have recently launched a new cookery book which contains everyday recipes from Mum's & Dad's around the country. The book was created with chef Jean Christophe Novelli's favourite recipes from a competition run earlier in the year on their Facebook page.
The book includes a range of recipes including cakes and cookies as well as savoury dishes.
At the moment Flora are running a competition where you can win a weeks worth of family dinners as well as a copy of the cookbook. You just need to download a copy of the book and try one of the recipes out and send a bite-size recipe review. You can read more about the competition here, as well as downloading a copy of the great little book.
I was challenged by Flora to cook one of the recipes from the book for my own family and share my thoughts. I was sent the ingredients for Keralan Prawn Biriyani and although I'm not that keen on prawns my husband and daughter love them, so I was happy to give it a go.
Keralan Prawn Biriyani
Preparation time
30 minutes
Cooking time
20–25 minutes
Serves
4–6
Course
Mains and soups
Main ingredient
Fish
Ingredients:
Masala
- 500g raw tiger prawns, peeled
- 1 tsp chilli powder
- ½ tsp turmeric powder
- Salt
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 3 tbsps ginger paste
- 3 tbsps garlic paste
- 2–3 green chillies, left whole but slit vertically
- 2 tsps ground coriander
- 125ml water
- 2 tbsps lemon juice
- 10 chopped mint leaves or 1 tsp mint sauce
- 1 ½ tsps garam masala
- 5 sprigs of chopped coriander leaves or 2 tsp coriander paste
Rice
- 350g basmati rice
- 3 tbsps Flora Cuisine
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 1250ml water
- Salt
Garnish
- Roasted cashew nuts, optional
- Fried raisins, optional
- Fried onions, optional
1. Toss the prawns with chilli, turmeric and salt and set aside to marinate for 20 minutes.
2. Now cook the rice. Pour the water in a pot and add 350g of rice to it. Cook in the microwave at full power for 20 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, heat the Flora Cuisine in a non-stick frying pan. Add in the onion and fry, stirring, until softened. Take the rice pot from microwave, mix in the fried onion with salt to taste and resume cooking the rice in the microwave for the remaining time.
4. In the same frying pan, fry the marinated prawns in 2 batches. Fry each batch of prawns on one side for 4–5 minutes, then turn the prawns and fry for another minute. Using a slotted spoon, transfer them to a kitchen towel.
5. Using the same pan, fry the onion for prawn masala till light brown. Add ginger paste, garlic paste and green chillies and mix in. Add in ground and fresh chopped coriander, 125ml water, salt, the fried prawns, lemon juice, mint and garam masala and simmer gently.
6. Once the rice is cooked through, use a fork to fluff it up. Lightly mix the rice and the prawn masala together and garnish with roasted cashew nuts, raisins and fried onions. Serve with yogurt raita, hot pickle and poppadoms.
This dish was really easy to prepare and turned out really well. I never normally cook rice in the microwave and I was really surprised how well it turned out. I often end up overcooking rice in a pan but this method of cooking it makes it easier to make sure it doesn't get overcooked. I was sent cooked prawns so I just added them towards the end of cooking.
There was a 'cook's tip' at the bottom of the recipe suggesting to layer everything up and bake for an additional amount of time, which I did, which allows the rice to soak up the sauce. I scattered some raisins and almonds over the dish and served it with yoghurt and mint raita.
The dish was full of flavour and I even ate the prawns, but I couldn't convince Sam to try one - although he did say he would for £10! He did eat a plateful of rice and sauce (minus prawns) and gave it the thumbs up, as did the husband an Hanna, who absolutely loved it all.
I will definitely make this Biriyani again but next time I'll probably use chicken so everyone can enjoy the complete dish.
I was sent a copy of the cookbook and all ingredients needed to cook the dish, for the purpose of this post
