Daab Chingri Recipe Or Prawn Cooked In Tender Coconut Shell

Hello Readers! Hope you are doing great and enjoying your time in kitchen. Today, I will begin my blog with few simple questions. How many times, the reference of dishes close to nature have excited you? How many of you miss or rather, how many times you crave for the dishes which not only give a new level of satisfaction to your taste buds, but also signify your roots? How many times mention of certain dishes take you back to the time, which we guessed and gazed through our history books but never lived it? And most importantly, how many times have you spent bombs, just for the mere purpose of getting the glimpse of that era and its simplicity, authenticity and the satisfaction in truest sense, through this delicate but assertive taste buds?

I know, the above-mentioned queries have somehow forced those emotions to pop up. Which we knowingly or unknowingly, intentionally or unintentionally put in the so-called jar made of daily chores and priorities and then tightly cover the jar with the lid made of practical approach towards life. But, as life would have it, sometimes emotions overrule pragmatism, and these emotions come out in the form of desire, which we human beings do not know how to control.

One such emotion that takes the form of a dish and that holds the power to weave its magic in our heart is ‘Daab Chingri’. As the name suggests, ‘Daab,’ meaning tender green coconut in Bengali, and ‘Chingri’ meaning ‘Prawn’, this is a dish where prawns are cooked in a coconut shell using the fresh coconut flesh and coconut water. Traditionally, Daab Chingris were cooked on wood burning clay stoves, where prawns were left to be cooked inside tender coconut within the simmering chulha. The coconut flesh mixed with the mustard gravy gradually melted in the heat, lending the dish a wonderful flavour. Although, cooking has evolved over time, but this is a dish where the basic traditional process is retained, primarily for the essence of the flavour and hence connecting our roots and history with the modern contemporary innovation.

So, join me to create the masterpiece that will take us to another level and another era of culinary world.

For more prawn recipe, check out, ‘Shorshe Bhapa Chingri Recipe’.

Recipe: Daab Chingri Or Prawn Cooked In Tender Coconut Shell

Preparation Time: 30 minutes Cooking Time: 1 hour Yield: Serves 6 – 8 Equipment used: A grinder, a mixing bowl, a pan, a turner, a pressure cooker and a tender coconut shell

Ingredients:

• 400 gm jumbo prawns
• 1 tender coconut with lots of flesh and big in size
• 200 ml coconut milk
• 1 tablespoon black or yellow mustard seeds (Based on your pungency preference. Yellow being less, black being high)
• ½ X ½ inch ginger
• 1 medium sized nicely sliced onion
• 8 – 10 chopped garlic cloves
• 3 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon mustard oil
• ½ teaspoon turmeric powder
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 slit green chillies
• ½ cup wheat flour kneaded to dough

Method:

• Wash the prawns and keep them aside
• Cut the head of tender coconut with a knife to make a big hole and cut the bottom of the shell to make it stand properly
• Take out the coconut water and scoop out the coconut flesh from the shell
• Grind the coconut flesh with mustard seeds, ginger and little bit of tender coconut water taken out from the shell
• Heat a pan and add 2 tablespoons of oil into the pan, when the pan is hot
• Add the washed prawns along with ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder and ½ teaspoon salt. Fry them till they start changing color
• Transfer the fried prawns to a bowl and add another tablespoon of oil into the same pan
• Once the oil is hot, saute chopped garlic, followed by sliced onion
• Once the onion turns golden brown, add the mustard and coconut flesh paste, coconut milk, and the balance tender coconut water
• Cook the above ingredients till bubbles form
• Add the fried prawns followed by green chillies and ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
• When you acquire the desired thickness for the gravy, add 1&1/2 teaspoon salt
• Remove pan from heat. Fill the coconut shell with the cooked prawn and gravy and cover the coconut shell with the wheat dough
• Fill one half of pressure cooker with water and place the coconut shell in the pressure cooker
• If possible close the pressure cooker lid and cook till one whistle
• If the shell is bigger to be closed, just leave it open and cook for almost half an hour
• Remove the shell from heat and leave it for 5 minutes before uncovering.
• Pour a teaspoon of mustard oil on the gravy and enjoy the dish with piping hot steamed rice

Wash the prawns properly.

Cut the head and bottom of the tender coconut. Take out the water and the coconut flesh.

Grind the coconut flesh, mustard seeds and tender coconut water to a smooth paste.

Add 2 tablespoons oil into a pan and fry the prawns along with turmeric powder and salt.

Shift the fried prawns to a bowl once they change colour.

Add oil into the same pan and saute garlic when the oil is hot.

Fry the onion with garlic, till the onion pieces turn golden brown.

Add the mustard and coconut flesh paste, coconut milk and the balance tender coconut water.

Add cooked prawns along with green chilli and turmeric powder

Add salt after the gravy acquires the desired thickness.

Remove the pan from heat and fill the coconut shell with the cooked prawn and gravy.

Cover the coconut shell with wheat dough.

Cook the coconut shell in a pressure cooker, half filled with water.

Pour a teaspoon of mustard oil after removing from heat.

Tips:

• If using non-stick, heat the pan on low flame
• Don’t over fry the prawns. Just fry them so that the raw smell goes off
• The quantity for wheat mentioned above in the ‘Ingredient’ section is ½ cup. However, as the objective is just to cover the shell properly, less or more quantity of wheat is also fine as per your convenience and as per the size of the opening of the shell

Note: There might be some gravies left. It was there for me. I mixed the leftover prawn cooked in the shell with the leftover gravy cooked in the pan. The taste was different, but trust me it was good.