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Prawn Malay Gravy Curry with White Pumpkin or Cucumber

A prawn curry cooked with coconut milk, lemon grass, and either white pumpkin or cucumber.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Coconut and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,648 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Prawn Malay Gravy Curry with White Pumpkin or Cucumber

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the prawns

  1. Remove the heads and shells from the prawns and parboil them to eliminate any fishy smell.

Cook the curry

  1. In a pan, heat ghee and add the ground hot spices until brown.

  2. Add the prawns and salt, frying until they are a light brown.

  3. Drain the water from the pumpkin or cucumber, then add it to the pan.

  4. Pour in the coconut milk and add the lemon-grass.

  5. Simmer the mixture over low heat for about 30 minutes until the curry is ready.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Coconut + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,648 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Coconut + pumpkintop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together302 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  3. Coconut + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Milk + pumpkintop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  5. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Prawns
Provide the main protein, which firms and turns opaque as it cooks.
Coconut milk
Adds richness and body, softening the heat of the spices in the sauce.
White pumpkin or cucumber
Adds moisture and mild sweetness, and soaks up the flavour of the sauce.
Ground hot spices
Provide heat and aroma, deepened by browning them in ghee.

The step that matters

Browning the spices in ghee. Frying ground spices in fat until they brown releases their fat-soluble aroma compounds. Burning them turns the flavour bitter, so keep the heat moderate and stir constantly.

Swap the pumpkin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (coconut, milk, lemon, grass, ghee):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Pumpkinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against coconut, milk, lemon, grass, ghee. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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