chile pepper • cilantro • garlic • lemon juice • oil (olive oil) • onion • parsley • prawns or shrimp • red pepper flakes • salt • vinegar (cider vinegar) • vinegar (wine vinegar) • Southern Africa • Mozambique • South Africa
L.M. Prawns
Look at a map, and you won’t find any city named Lourenço Marques (the Mozambican city is now known as Maputo); but look at a restaurant menu in South Africa and you might find Lourenco Marques Prawns, much better known as L.M. Prawns or Prawns Mozambique. Prawns from the waters off Mozambique, famous for their large size and delicious flavor, became a favorite of South Africans on holiday visiting Mozambique when it was a Portuguese colony. L.M. Prawns are most often marinated in a peri-peri merinade and grilled.
L.M. Prawns Recipe
Prawns marinated in a peri-peri merinade and grilled.
Ingredients
½ cup cooking oil (olive oil if possible)
2 hot red chile peppers (called peri-peri in Southern Africa), cleaned and chopped — and/or — one spoonful of red pepper flakes
1 tbsp lemon juice — and/or — cider vinegar or wine vinegar
1 garlic clove, minced
½ onion, finely chopped (optional)
½ tsp parsley or cilantro, chopped
4 salt (to taste)
8 prawns or shrimp, the larger, the better — cleaned, de-veined, tails left on
Instructions
1
In a glass or nonmetallic bowl, mix all the ingredients except the prawns. Before adding the prawns, pour about half of the mixture into another bowl or jar to reserve for use as a sauce. Some people prepare the marinade a day or two in advance so as to allow it to age in the refrigerator before use. Add the prawns to the remaining marinade, turn and toss them gently to make sure they are covered. Marinate for at least two hours or longer. (Be careful not to get the hot pepper mixture in your eyes.)
2
Thread the prawns on skewers, if desired. Cook the prawns on a charcoal grill over glowing coals (or in the oven under the broiler if grilling is impossible), turning once and basting with the cooked marinade. Depending on their size, cooking times will vary — a few minutes per side, more or less. Be careful not to overcook.
3
Serve immediately with the reserved sauce for dipping.
Ingredients
½ cup cooking oil (olive oil if possible)
2 hot red chile peppers (called peri-peri in Southern Africa), cleaned and chopped — and/or — one spoonful of red pepper flakes
1 tbsp lemon juice — and/or — cider vinegar or wine vinegar
1 garlic clove, minced
½ onion, finely chopped (optional)
½ tsp parsley or cilantro, chopped
4 salt (to taste)
8 prawns or shrimp, the larger, the better — cleaned, de-veined, tails left on
Directions
1
In a glass or nonmetallic bowl, mix all the ingredients except the prawns. Before adding the prawns, pour about half of the mixture into another bowl or jar to reserve for use as a sauce. Some people prepare the marinade a day or two in advance so as to allow it to age in the refrigerator before use. Add the prawns to the remaining marinade, turn and toss them gently to make sure they are covered. Marinate for at least two hours or longer. (Be careful not to get the hot pepper mixture in your eyes.)
2
Thread the prawns on skewers, if desired. Cook the prawns on a charcoal grill over glowing coals (or in the oven under the broiler if grilling is impossible), turning once and basting with the cooked marinade. Depending on their size, cooking times will vary — a few minutes per side, more or less. Be careful not to overcook.
3
Serve immediately with the reserved sauce for dipping.
Another way to cook Mozambique’s famous prawns is called Prawns Naçionale and is made by marinating the prawns in beer, bay leaf, cilantro, butter, lard, lemon juice, salt, and, of course, peri-peri.
Prawns vs. Shrimp — The word prawn is used to mean different things in different parts of the world. Sometimes prawns are a sort of miniture lobsters. Sometimes prawns are a sort of freshwater shrimp (and the word shimp is used to refer to saltwater species). Lastly, prawns are especially large shrimp, the kind that take 15 (or fewer) to make a pound. It is these prawns, “jumbo shrimp”, that should be used to make L.M. Prawns.
Mozambique had been famous for her prawns
Nick Middleton
Kalashnikovs and Zombie Cucumbers: Travels in Mozambiqueby Nick Middleton (London: Phoenix/Orion, 1994) is an account of travel in Mozambique in the early 1990s, including this about LM Prawns:
. . . Mozambique had been famous for her prawns, which were reputedly as large as you could imagine. They were still available in Maputo restaurants, but their size was not a patch on the old days. . . .
A landmark in the dawn of the new age came in mid-1992 when Maputo’s Polona Hotel was officially reopened. . . .
An insensitive press release issued by the hotel management to mark the occasion suggested that Karos Hotels of South Africa were expecting a return to the pre-independence days when the Polona stood on the Rua A. W. Bayly: ‘South Africans will again be able to sip sundowners on the patio of the Polona overlooking the warm Indian ocean with its palm-fringed shores’, the statement read. ‘LM Prawns’ and abundant fresh fish ‘cooked in traditional Portuguese style’ were offered as irresistible attractions. The ‘LM’ of the prawns referred to Lourenço Marques, as if seventeen years of independence counted for nothing.
[The Colonial Themepark]