Prawns in coconut gravy along with drumstick (chemmeen muringyakol in the native language ) is a delicious dish from northern Kerala or Malabar in India. You can also green mangoes or snake gourd instead of drumsticks. Vegetarians can even omit the prawn or shrimp and make the same curry with only the drumstick, which tastes equally great!
Drumsticks may not be available year-round in the U.S. but frozen ones are readily available in any Indian grocery store. Using any of the veggies with the prawn imparts that unique flavor of the shrimp to it which makes the curry very delicious. Prawn and Shrimp give unique flavors to any curry and Goan Shrimp Curry is one such popular curry.
Why does this curry stand out?
- It is very easy to make as it needs only a few ingredients.
- The taste is so good and goes best with rice.
- The same curry can be made with vegetables alone.
- When using prawns with a combination of drumsticks, the drumstick can be substituted with any gourd or green mango as well.
Ingredients needed
- Prawn
- Frozen grated coconut or fresh
- Ginger coarsely cut
- Tomatoes finely chopped
- Green chilies slit
- Shallots halved
- Tamarind lemon-sized ball (juice squeezed)
- Turmeric powder
- Red Chili powder or as tolerated
- curry leaves
Prawns in coconut gravy preparation
Using fresh coconut in this recipe will give an authentic taste. However, you can use frozen grated coconut as it is easily available here and it tastes good. Grind it well to a fine paste with just about enough water. It is also better to use fresh prawns/shrimp if available, else one can always use frozen ones.
Boil Tamarind juice along with green chilies, shallots, and ginger till the raw smell evaporates. Add the prawns and shrimp, later the ground coconut is added into the gravy. The tempering of this curry is also very important and it lends a very nice flavor to the curry. This goes best with white rice.
If you love coconut-based gravy curries, another grated coconut curry that you may want to try is Kerala Kadala curry which uses roasted coconut.
Prawns in coconut gravy
Ingredients
- 10 -15 Prawn (Shrimp) medium sized
- ¼ packet coconut Frozen grated or fresh
- 1-inch ginger coarsely cut
- 2 Tomatoes finely chopped
- 3 green chilies slit
- 8-10 shallots halved
- 1 small Tamarind lemon-sized ball (juice squeezed)
- ½ tsp Turmeric powder
- 2 tsp Red Chili powder or as tolerated
- 1 sprig curry leaves
For Tempering
- 1 tsp mustard seeds
- 3-4 shallots finely chopped
Instructions
- Grind the coconut with one shallot and little water to a very fine paste.
- Take a deep bottomed pan and boil the tamarind extract with the ginger, green chilies, shallots, and tomatoes with a little water.
- Add salt and spices turmeric and chilly powder to it.
- Once the raw taste of the tamarind is gone, add the shrimp and cook till it is done.
- Add curry leaves and boil for 2 more mins.
- Add the coconut paste and boil for about 5 to 10 mins till a nice yellow color is obtained.
- Turn off heat.
- Heat 2 spoons of oil in a small pan and add mustard seeds.
- After the mustard seeds splutter, add finely cut shallots and fry until reddish-brown.
- Add this to the curry. Serve with rice. Enjoy!
Nutrition
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I have never heard of coconut gravy....awesome!
Good one ---
Thank you Sangita!