Seafood Laksa

Name: Seafood Laksa
Yield: Serves 4–6
Ingredients: 2 cm (¾ inch) piece ginger or galangal, chopped; 3 garlic cloves, halved; 1 onion, roughly chopped; 2–6 red chillies, seeded, finely chopped; 80 ml (2½ fl oz/1⅓ cup) oil; 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) raw prawns (shrimp); 3 lemongrass stems, white part only, chopped; 1–2 teaspoons shrimp paste; 625 ml (21 fl oz/2½ cups) coconut cream; 2 teaspoons grated palm sugar (jaggery) or soft brown sugar; 1 teaspoon ground turmeric; 1 tablespoon ground coriander; coriander (cilantro) leaves, to serve; 1–2 tablespoons fish sauce; 4 kaffir lime leaves, lightly crushed; chopped mint, to serve; 250 g (9 oz) dried rice vermicelli; 250 g (9 oz) bean sprouts; 190 g (6¾ oz) packet tofu puffs; 200 g (7 oz) packet fish balls

Preparation info

Serves
4–6

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

The Cook's Book of Everything

By Lulu Grimes

Published 2009

About

A spicy noodle soup popular in Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines, laksa is a blend of Chinese, Indian and Malaysian cuisines. Laksa can be made with readymade laksa paste, sold in supermarkets. The recipe below gives the method for making the paste yourself.

Ingredients

1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) raw prawns (shrimp)
80

Fish course
Pescatarian
Soup
Breakfast
Spicy

Method

Peel the prawns and gently pull out the dark vein from each prawn back, starting at the head end. Keep the shells, heads and tails. Cover the prawn meat and refrigerate.
To make the prawn stock, heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large, heavy-based sau