Preserved Lemon Prawn Skewers

Method

1. If you are using bamboo skewers, submerge them in cold water for 30 minutes so they do not catch on the bars.
2. Make the yoghurt first, while your hands are still clean. Stir the two reserved tablespoons of marinade through the yoghurt with the chopped preserved lemon skin and half the herbs. Cover and keep it cold.
3. Pat the prawns dry with paper towel and lay them out on a board.
4. Thread each prawn twice. Let it sit in its natural curve, push the skewer through the tail end, then bring it through again at the thick part near the head. Pinned in two places, a prawn cannot spin when you turn the skewer, which is the difference between two cooked sides and four half-cooked ones.
5. Put three or four prawns on each skewer with about 5mm between them. Pushed up hard against each other they steam where they touch and never colour there.
6. Light the barbecue before the prawns are dressed. Burners up, lid closed, settled at about 220°C for 10 minutes so the bars sear instead of sticking. Brush them down.
7. Sit the skewers in a shallow tray in a single layer. Spoon the four tablespoons of marinade over, turn them until every prawn is coated, and grind black pepper over the top.
8. Set a timer for 15 minutes and leave the tray on the bench. Room temperature prawns cook more evenly than fridge-cold ones.
9. Drizzle the olive oil over the skewers and turn them once. Oiling the prawns rather than the bars keeps the flare-ups down.
10. Lay the skewers across the bars and leave the lid open so you can watch them. Give them 3 minutes without moving them.
11. Turn each skewer once and give it 2 to 3 minutes more. Judge the flesh, not the clock: white and opaque right through the thick end, and still soft when you press it. Springy means you went past it.
12. Lift them onto a warm platter and scatter the chilli garlic salt flakes over now, at the end. The jar is already salted, so this is the only seasoning that goes on after it.
13. Squeeze a lemon wedge over the lot, scatter the rest of the herbs, and take the yoghurt, the olives, the pita crisps, the remaining wedges and a green salad out with them.

The skewers that did not get eaten

Pull the prawns off the sticks while they are still warm and keep them cold for a day. Folded through the leftover yoghurt with a handful of herbs, they are lunch on flatbread. Reheating is the one thing not to do, because a prawn cooked once has no margin left.

Questions about prawn skewers

How long should prawns sit in preserved lemon marinade?

15 minutes, and 20 at the outside. The jar is salted, and salt on a peeled prawn starts to firm the surface well before an hour is up, which leaves you with something closer to cured than raw. If you forget the step entirely you have lost nothing: spoon the marinade over the prawns after they come off the grill instead, which works because the jar needs no cooking.

Metal or bamboo skewers?

Metal, if you have them. They carry heat into the prawn from the inside, which brings the middle up faster, and they never burn. Flat ones are better again, because a round skewer lets the prawn rotate however carefully you threaded it. Soaked bamboo works perfectly well, and two sticks run parallel through the same prawns solve the spinning problem for nothing.

How do I cook prawn skewers indoors?

A ridged griddle pan is the closest thing. Get it properly hot, work in two batches, and press the skewers down for the first few seconds a side. The oven grill also works, rack near the top, 3 minutes a side.

What else does this marinade do on a grill?

It holds up on anything that cooks fast and hot. Our barbecued whole snapper takes three tablespoons rubbed into the scores of a whole fish. For another skewer on the same barbecue, the halloumi and padron pepper skewers feed everyone who is not eating prawns.

The preserved lemon marinade is $22.95 for 260g, and the rest of the Ottolenghi range travels in the same box. Shipping is free Australia-wide on orders over $100, and orders placed before 12pm on a weekday are dispatched the same day from our Corio, VIC warehouse, tracked with Australia Post. The olives, the pita crisps and the rest of the summer table sit in festive entertaining essentials.