Prawn Cocktail

Prawn Cocktail is a classic and rightly so.

Tender, juicy prawns in a lightly spicy, creamy Marie Rose sauce atop fresh salad.

While you can buy bottles of the sauce, making your own takes just a few minutes. All you need are mayo, ketchup and a few simple seasonings.

Stir cooked prawns through the sauce, chop up some lettuce, cucumber, spring onion, herbs and you’ve a deliciously retro, super-fast first course or salad.

No one seems to know exactly when and where the Prawn Cocktail was invented.

Some say it was in the US. Others (apparently quite wrongly) that it was famed British TV cook Fanny Cradock.

What is known is that after huge popularity, by 1967 even Fanny was lamenting:

“One of the most sordid little offerings is the ubiquitous Prawn Cocktail with… a tired prawn drooping disconsolately over the edge of the glass like a debutante at the end of her first ball and its opposite number – a piece of lemon… clutching the opposite side of the rim like a seasick passenger against a taffrail during a rough Channel crossing.“

But the times they are a-changing back. Because, like growing numbers of people. I think that a fresh, homemade Prawn Cocktail can be a wonderful thing.

I even made it as the starter for our last Christmas dinner.

My version has small, juicy prawns in a creamy, lightly piquant dressing, sitting on a bed of simple fresh salad: lettuce, cucumber, spring onion, chives.

Lovely as a first course or main meal salad, Prawn Cocktail is also incredibly quick and easy, especially if you buy ready cooked and peeled prawns.

The Prawns

I always use cold- water prawns in my Prawn Cocktail. Small, sweet and juicy, they’re just perfect for this recipe.

Wild caught in seas such as the North Atlantic, they’re also more environmentally sound for us in the UK. Warm water prawns will almost certainly be farmed and have travelled thousands of miles.

By all means use fresh, unpeeled cooked or uncooked prawns if you like. Buy enough to end up with 250 grams after preparing.

However, for convenience, I pick up a bag of quick frozen cooked, peeled prawns bearing the Marine Stewardship Council’s ecolabel.

I defrost the bag in the fridge overnight, snip off the corner and pour the melted ice glaze down the sink.

So that the prawns are nice and dry, I briefly sit them on a piece of kitchen towel.

Marie Rose Sauce

Just as the origins of Prawn Cocktail are unclear, the Marie Rose who gave her name to the famously pink sauce is unknown.

While you can buy bottles of the stuff, there’s really no need. You almost certainly have the ingredients in your fridge and kitchen cupboards.

The base of the sauce is simply mayonnaise and tomato ketchup. The usual additions are lemon juice and/or Worcestershire sauce plus some optional heat in the form of Tabasco sauce.

I do add a squeeze of lemon but, as I don’t keep Worcestershire or Tabasco sauce in the house, I use a couple of alternatives. I always have Balsamic vinegar and sriracha sauce and find these work great. But use whichever you prefer.

To add even more flavour, I include one of my favourite spices: smoked paprika. You can leave this out, but I love the hint of smokiness it brings.

Whisk everything together, have a taste, then adjust the seasoning to your liking.

And that’s it. Marie Rose sauce in about two minutes flat.

If you want to make the sauce in advance cover and store in the fridge for up to 24 hours.

The Salad

I never eat iceberg lettuce which you always used to find in Prawn Cocktail. I think it’s absolutely tasteless. But I do like a crisp lettuce and most often choose Romaine for this recipe.

If making the dish as a starter, I allow one large handful of shredded lettuce per person. To that I add deseeded, finely chopped cucumber, spring onion and chives.

Before tossing the salad ingredients together, I reserve a little of the cucumber, onion and herb to use as a garnish.

There isn’t a cocktail glass in the world big enough to hold the amount of Prawn Cocktail I want to eat.

So I use these lovely old, heavy dessert glasses which belonged to my partner’s grandma. If you don’t have anything like this then bowls will do.

Take a tip from Fanny though and make a little hollow in the middle of each salad, “so that when the prawn mixture is filled in all the lettuce does not have to be excavated”.

Serving Prawn Cocktail

When you’re ready to serve, fold the prawns through the Marie Rose sauce.

It may look like too much dressing, but don’t worry.

The sauce isn’t just for the prawns because, as you eat, it will lovingly dress the salad too.

First spoon the prawns and sauce into the hollows you made. Then pile up the rest, leaving a ring of lettuce all around.

Finally, sprinkle over the reserved cucumber, spring onion and chives. I also add a pinch of smoked paprika and a few Aleppo pepper flakes.

Doesn’t that look good?

Prawn Cocktail: a Retro Classic

Perhaps some people still regard the Prawn Cocktail as irredeemably naff.

Others want to modernise and gentrify it with pan seared king prawns, homemade tomato sauce and the like.

But I love my version. Close to the well-loved classic, but quick, easy and so good!

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