Garlic Prawns with Courgette Noodles
Prawns cooked hard in garlic, chilli and olive oil, tossed through courgette ribbons that never see a pan — 45 g of protein and 17 g of carbohydrate.
Photograph credit: Zucchini Pad Thai (164359215) by Chuck Harmston · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons · this resized copy is shared under the same licence
Courgette noodles turn to water because people cook them. They do not need it — tossed raw through something hot they soften in about a minute and keep their bite, and any longer than that and you have soup. Salting and draining them first pulls out most of the water before it can reach the pan.
Questions About Garlic Prawns with Courgette Noodles
How long does Garlic Prawns with Courgette Noodles take to make?
15 minutes of preparation and 10 minutes of cooking, plus 15 minutes of salting, so allow 40 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 2.
Garlic Prawns with Courgette Noodles: Step by Step
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Spiralise or julienne the courgettes, toss with the half teaspoon of salt and leave them in a colander for 15 minutes.
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Squeeze them gently in a cloth. A surprising amount of water comes out, and all of it would otherwise end up in the pan.
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Pat the prawns completely dry.
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Heat 3 tablespoons of the oil in a wide pan over medium heat and add the garlic and chilli. Cook 2 minutes until the garlic is pale gold — take it off the moment it colours, because it goes bitter in seconds after that.
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Turn the heat to high, add the prawns in one layer and cook 90 seconds a side, until just opaque and curled into a loose C. A tight O means overcooked.
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Take the pan off the heat and add the lemon zest and juice, the remaining salt and pepper.
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Add the courgette and the last tablespoon of oil and toss for 1 minute in the residual heat only. Do not put it back on the hob.
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Fold through the parsley and serve at once.
Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.
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Worth Getting Right
- Salt and squeeze the courgette. This is the whole difference between a plate of noodles and a puddle.
- A loose C, not a tight O. Prawns go from perfect to rubbery in about thirty seconds.
- Take the pan off the heat before the courgette goes in. Residual heat is all it needs.
Swaps and Variations
- An eighth of a teaspoon of garlic powder per clove is the stand-in usually given when you are out of fresh garlic; it will not brown the same way, and it burns easily, so add it with the liquid.
Pairs Well With
A cold Picpoul or Vinho Verde · A green salad with plenty of vinegar · Bread to mop the oil, for anyone not counting carbohydrate
Sides from the same cuisine on this site: Tuscan Panzanella, Creamy Parmesan Polenta, Ciabatta.
Storage
Best immediately; the courgette softens within the hour. The prawns keep 2 days refrigerated and are good cold over a salad, but the assembled dish does not hold.
What's in a Serving
Per serving, calculated from the ingredient list with USDA FoodData Central figures (SR Legacy). A calculation, not a laboratory analysis: brands, cuts and how you measure change the real numbers. How the figures are worked out.
Your notes on this recipe
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Compiled by Turab
Checked by script for timings, diet labels and nutrition arithmetic. How the recipes are checked. Found a mistake? Tell us.
First published ; last changed .