I love this dish, one of my favourite starters. I’ve wanted to recreate this dish for a while, last night was my first attempt at this. I do agree with the legend Dan Toombs, you can judge a good curry house on its prawn puri.

Ingredients- rapeseed oil, 1 star anise, small piece of cinnamon stick, 2 tbsp of garlic & ginger paste, 1 onion finely diced, 1 green chilli diced, 1/2 tsp of chilli powder, 1 tsp cumin powder, 1/2 cup of tomato purée mixed with water, 2 cups of premade base sauce, 160g of small freshwater prawns (keeping them cost down), 2 tomatoes cut into small bite size pieces, 1 tsp of dried fenugreek leaves, juice of a lemon, pinch of salt, shop bought chapattis warmed in the oven, handful of chopped coriander.

Method – heat the rapeseed oil in a heavy pan. Once the oil is hot add the star anise and cinnamon stick, let these sizzle for 30 seconds or so. Follow these with the chopped onion and fried for 5 minutes or so.

Once the onions have taken a nice colour add the diced green chilli and garlic and ginger paste. Allow this to sizzle for another minute.

Add the chilli powder and cumin powder, give it a good stir and mix well.

Add the tomato purée quickly followed by the base sauce.

Allow the mixture to come together and reduce.

Add the chopped tomatoes and cook for another couple of minutes.

Reduce the dish further then add the prawns. I used freshwater prawns to reduce the cost but you can use any prawns you wish.

After two minutes add the salt, fenugreek, chopped coriander, lemon juice, stir well and serve.

Serve on the pre-warmed chapatis.

The perfect starter. An all time favourite of mine.

Thank you for reading my ramblings. Recipe credited to Dan Toombs.