This is the starter for a Valentine’s dinner for two, with rhyming venison wellington as a main course and blood orange sorbet (or a gooey chocolate and coffee cake) as a pud. In the UK fennel is in season from July to November.
Cup and sauce prawn, fennel and paprika
Ingredients
- 1 x fennel bulb, thinly sliced and chopped into small pieces which can easily be eaten with a teaspoon. Reserve a couple of fronds for garnish
- smoked salt
- 2 tbsp pink martini
- 2 medium cloves garlic, crushed with the smoked salt
- 2 knobs of butter – about 30g
- slosh of olive oil (about one tbsp)
- 75g ideally uncooked, but you can get away with cooked, king prawns, shelled
- ½ teasp Spanish sweet smoked paprika
Instructions
- Mix the fennel, the pink martini and the butter and divide between two attractive cups (or ramekins).
- Put into microwave on 700W for two minutes.
- Meanwhile fry the garlic gently in a little olive oil.
- Add the prawns and the paprika.
- Stir the contents of the two cups, and zap them in the microwave another two minutes.
- Take the prawn/garlic mixture off the heat once they are hot (if you cook them too much they get tough).
- Top the fennel with the fried prawns and a sprinkling more of paprika, top with the fennel fronds and serve with saucers whether using cups or ramekins.