Well, alright! I’d be the first to accept that the image of this dish doesn’t look anything like the image of the startling sunset at the bottom of this post, but it really did inspire the idea. The black rice was Homer’s wine-dark sea, and the pink prawns and yellow peppers were the sunset…..

Why sweet and salty? Well, the pepper and caramelised onion give the sweetness, and the lardons lend the saltiness.

All in all a result, and a very quick and easy result – this is a one-pot dish: carbs, protein and vegetables all included.

Recipe for sunset-inspired sweet and salty prawns with black rice

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 250g/9 oz (half a normal packet) of black rice (or wild rice, or a rice mix)
• 1 fat clove of garlic crushed with 1 tsp smoked salt
• 1 tsp Aleppo pepper (or ½ tsp dried chilli flakes)
• Juice and zest of half a lemon
• About 12 big, fat, cooked prawns
• 1 orange pepper, deseeded and chopped finely
• Olive oil for frying
• About 80g/4 oz/ lardons, or about 5 rashers of bacon
• 1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
• 1 tbsp furikake
• Small bunch of flat-leaf parsley

Method

1. Cook the rice according to the packet instructions (usually by boiling for about 20 minutes…longer for wild rice)
2. Chop the bacon if using, and add that or the lardons to an oiled frying pan with the pepper and the onion – add a bit more oil if you need to, but some fat will come out of the lardons. Fry gently until the onion is translucent.
3. Add the garlic and stir.
4. Add the prawns and stir. Add the lemon juice and zest, and stir.
5. Drain the rice. Snip in most of the parsley, including the stalks. Add the contents of the frying pan, and stir through.
6. Serve the rice, garnished with the rest of the snipped parsley and the furikake.