Try these peppered prawns

Drool over this simple and subtle prawn recipe from coastal Andhra Pradesh 

It’s time the cobwebs were cleared once for all. There is more to South Indian cuisine than idli, dosa, vada and sambar. The dakshin repertoire goes much beyond uttapam, upma, limited meals, and even sublime home-cooked delicacies — myriad poriyal, thoran, kozhambu et al. what we are leading up to is the largely undiscovered non-vegetarian gems. The gentlemen, who introduced us North Indians to the repast south of the Vindhya mountain ranges and Narmada river belonged to the Brahmin caste and mostly hailed from Tamil Nadu or Udupi in Karnataka.

Such was the power of the culinary magic they created that few yearned for anything more. Carnivores seldom ventured beyond Hyderabad. What a joy it was when we first encountered the Chettinad cooking.`A0Chettiyars were the intrepid ‘merchant princes,’ who voyaged to South-East Asia in millennia before the birth of Christ and acquired a taste for food sans frontiers. Much later, we discovered other genres of non-vegetarian South Indian cooking — Nadar, Muslim and Christian in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. These simple as well as subtle recipes deserve unveiling at the national level. It is a matter of satisfaction that some specialty ethnic eateries are now doing this in style. Zambar in the DLF Promenade in the Capital offers a seafood platter that has many fishy delights. However, the sampler had a small tantalising portion of prawns that had us drooling and lip-smacking long after the meal was over. Dear readers, forgive our obsession with the jhinga; we promise to be even-handed in future and redress the imbalance soon with an uninterrupted flow of vegetables, but do try this absolute beauty.

Butter Pepper Prawn Masala

Ingredients
Prawns (Tiger or medium, shelled, de-veined, head removed) 200 g
Black peppercorns (freshly ground) 2 tsp
Sambar powder/gunpowder/ 1 tsp
muluga podi (readymade)
Onion (small, chopped fine, optional) one
Garlic cloves (peeled and chopped) 3-4 
Green ginger (scraped and chopped) 1 inch piece
Red chilli powder (optional) ½ tsp
Butter 2 tbsp
Salt to taste

Method
Wash and pat dry the prawns. Heat butter in a non-stick pan. Add chopped onion. Stir-fry till the onions change colour. Put in garlic and ginger and continue frying on medium heat for a minute. Add prawns and cook, stirring continuously till these begin to turn pink. Add the powdered spices and salt. Mix well to coat the prawns. Remove from flame. Serve hot.

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