Cereal Butter Prawns

Cereal Butter Prawns

Cereal butter prawns is one on my family’s favorite dish. What we like most of this dish is the crunchy cereal that blends well with crispy prawns. When I first tried this dish, I instantly like it as it has unique combination, cereal and prawn. I also wondered how they make the cereal so tasty and crispy like that! It was a dinner with my friends when I first encountered this dish.

Eating this dish outside is expensive, so, I searched and tried different recipes but still could not get the same texture of cereal like the ones that we are having outside, they clamp together and do not stick to the prawn also. Here is how my cereal prawn looks like before.

 

I am starting to think that maybe there is a secret recipe for the cereal, why they can cook it like that. Still, I never give up on my search, then, come one day I found a perfect and simple recipe for this dish which truly resembles the taste and the textures of cereal from the ones that we order outside. I learned from this recipe that the secret recipe for cereal that I thought about is no other than “Nestum original cereal mix”.

The recipe is so simple that every time we crave for this dish, we can cook it anytime without any worries that the ingredients are not availabl. The only thing that you may have problem finding if you are not in Asia is the curry leaves. You can use coriander or parsley leaf, I tried it before and it still taste nice.

My kids are lazy to remove the prawn shells and I have to remove them. To resolve this issue, every time I cooked prawn, they will be half naked. I will remove the skin but retain the head and the last line of shell on the tail, but I only do this if need to fry the prawns.

Here is the recipe I am keeping and use every time I cook this dish.

Cereal Butter Prawns Recipe

Adopted from Kitchen Tigress Cereal Butter Prawns

Ingredients: for 2-4 persons

Prawn

300 g medium size prawns, trim, devein, trimmed, wash, and dry thoroughly (note: I half shelled my prawn here)

1 tsp salt
½ egg, beaten
2 tbsp plain flour or corn flour

Cereal mix
¾ cup Nestum cereal (original flavour)
½ tsp salt (if using salted butter) or 1 tsp salt (if using unsalted butter)
1 tsp sugar
1½ tbsp milk powder

For cooking:

Cooking oil for deep-frying
30 g (2 tbsp) unsalted or salted butter
1 red chilli (chili padi), thinly sliced (you can omit this or reduce to 1 if you do not want spicy)
6-10 sprigs curry leaves*, rinse and dry with paper towels; discard stalks

(*Note: you can use fresh coriander or parsley if curry leaves is not available)

 

Instructions:

Thoroughly stir ingredients for cereal mix. Set aside.

Sprinkle prawns with salt. Add egg and mix thoroughly.

(Note: Need extra careful here when handling the prawn if you half shelled them, the head may dislodge from the body)

Place the flour or corn flour on a plate or bowl then roll the prawns just enough to cover the prawn, shake off excess flour.

  

On a deep skillet or frying pan pre-heat the oil. Deep-fry the prawns on pre-heated oil over maximum heat possible till just cooked. Drain the excess oil.

On a separate pan, heat butter till bubbling and lightly brown. Add curry leaves and chilli. Fry over medium heat till fragrant.

Reduce heat to low. Add cereal mix. Stir till lightly golden. Curry leaves should crisp up as excess moisture is absorbed by cereal.

Add prawns and toss till well mixed, turn off heat at this point as cereal turns fully golden brown. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. 

 

 Transfer the cereal butter prawns on a serving plate and garnish some curry leaves and served. Enjoy