Camarones Guisados

Ingredients

• 700 g raw prawns, peeled and deveined
• 1 lime, juiced
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 onion, sliced thin
• 1 red pepper, cut into strips
• 5 garlic cloves, minced
• 4 culantro leaves, shredded
• 2 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 250 ml chicken stock
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• a handful of coriander, chopped
• 1 scotch bonnet, left whole — optional

Method

1. Dress the prawns

   Toss the prawns with the lime juice and a pinch of salt and leave them for ten minutes while you prep. Any longer and the acid starts to cook them, so they turn chalky the moment they hit the pot.

   10 min

2. Sear them fast

   Drain the prawns, sear them in a dry hot caldero for barely a minute a side, and lift them straight out onto a plate. They are going back into the sauce later; cook them through now and you will serve rubber.

3. Burn the sugar

   Add the oil and sugar to the same pot over medium heat and let the sugar go from amber to the colour of strong coffee, swirling, then stop. That bitter caramel is what gives a Dominican guiso its dark backbone, but two seconds past coffee it turns acrid and there is no rescuing it.

4. Sofrito into the caramel

   Tip in the onion, red pepper, garlic and culantro all at once; the vegetables' water stops the caramel dead. Stir for five minutes until everything has slumped and taken on the caramel colour.

5. Build the sauce

   Stir in the tomato puree and oregano, cook two minutes, then add the stock and the whole scotch bonnet if using and simmer for eight minutes until it coats a spoon. Reduce it properly here, because you cannot reduce it later without overcooking the prawns.

   8 min

6. Return the prawns

   Slide the prawns and any juices on the plate back in, grind in the black pepper and give them ninety seconds off the boil, just to warm through. The plate juices are seasoned stock; pouring them down the sink throws away the best part of the shellfish.

7. Finish

   Take out the chilli, scatter the coriander and serve over white rice with the sauce spooned generously on top.