Chef Thomas
Anglesey Eggs
Eggs bedded into leek-flecked mash under a blanket of sharp cheese sauce, baked until golden and bubbling. A Welsh supper dish that proves the simplest things are usually the best.
Culinary Explorer
A cooking platform built around craft, culture, and the stories behind what we eat.
Prawn and Chilli Linguine
Created by Chef Thomas
Linguine tossed with king prawns, garlic, chilli, and white wine, the kind of supper that takes less time to cook than it does to decide what to eat, and tastes like you knew all along.
Main Dishes
British
Weeknight
Quick Meal
10 min
Active Time
15 min cook•25 min total
Yield2 servings
The pan is already hot. The garlic is sliced. The wine is open, and you've poured yourself a glass before any of it went near the cooking. This is a Tuesday evening kind of dish, or a Friday when you're tired and want something that feels like a small reward for getting through the week.
Prawn and chilli linguine arrived in British kitchens sometime in the nineties, borrowed loosely from the Italian south, and it never left. It didn't leave because it works. Because it takes fifteen minutes and uses one pan and a pot of water, and because the smell of garlic and chilli softening in good olive oil is enough to make whoever else is in the house wander into the kitchen and ask what's for dinner. That's the whole performance. You don't need more than that.
The trick, if there is one, is restraint. Good prawns, a decent chilli, garlic sliced thin enough to melt into the oil, and a splash of wine that lifts everything without drowning it. The pasta water does the rest, pulling the oil and wine and prawn juices into a sauce that clings to the linguine like it belongs there. A recipe is a conversation, not a contract. If you've got a handful of cherry tomatoes going soft on the windowsill, halve them and throw them in. A few capers wouldn't hurt. But it doesn't need them. We're only making dinner.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
dried linguine
Quantity
200g
raw king prawns
Quantity
250g
peeled and deveined
good olive oil
Quantity
3 tablespoons
garlic
Quantity
3 cloves
sliced thinly
red chilli
Quantity
1
sliced finely, seeds in or out
dry white wine
Quantity
100ml
lemon
Quantity
half
juiced
flat-leaf parsley
Quantity
small handful
roughly chopped
fine sea salt
Quantity
to taste
black pepper
Quantity
to taste
freshly ground
dried chilli flakes (optional)
Quantity
pinch
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| dried linguine | 200g |
| raw king prawnspeeled and deveined | 250g |
| good olive oil | 3 tablespoons |
| garlicsliced thinly | 3 cloves |
| red chillisliced finely, seeds in or out | 1 |
| dry white wine | 100ml |
| lemonjuiced | half |
| flat-leaf parsleyroughly chopped | small handful |
| fine sea salt | to taste |
| black pepperfreshly ground | to taste |
| dried chilli flakes (optional) | pinch |
Equipment Needed
- •Large pan for boiling pasta
- •Wide skillet or frying pan, the biggest you have
- •Wooden spoon
- •Tongs for tossing the pasta
Instructions
- 1
Boil the pasta
Bring a large pan of water to a rolling boil and salt it generously. It should taste like the sea. Not a tentative pinch, a proper handful. Drop the linguine in and cook it until it still has a little resistance when you bite through, a minute or two less than the packet says. Before you drain it, scoop out a mugful of the starchy cooking water. You'll want it later.
That pasta water is doing more work than you think. The starch in it binds the sauce together, gives it a silky body that oil alone can't manage. Don't skip this. - 2
Warm the garlic and chilli
While the pasta cooks, pour the olive oil into a wide pan or skillet over a medium heat. Add the sliced garlic and chilli. Let them sizzle gently, moving them around now and then. You want the garlic to turn pale gold and the oil to start smelling like something you'd happily eat with a spoon. Two minutes, maybe less. Watch it. Garlic goes from golden to burnt in a breath, and burnt garlic is bitter and beyond rescue.
- 3
Cook the prawns
Turn the heat up. Add the prawns to the pan in a single layer and season them with salt and pepper as they hit the oil. Leave them alone for a minute. You want colour on the underside, a proper pink-gold sear, before you flip them. Once they've curled and turned opaque, no more than two minutes each side, they're done. Overcooked prawns are rubbery and sad and no amount of sauce will save them. If in doubt, pull them out early. They'll finish in the residual heat.
Pat the prawns dry with kitchen paper before they go in the pan. Wet prawns steam instead of searing, and you lose all that golden colour. - 4
Deglaze with wine
Pour in the white wine. It will hiss and spit and the kitchen will smell suddenly, sharply, of something worth sitting down for. Let it bubble away for thirty seconds or so, scraping up any sticky bits from the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Those sticky bits are flavour. Don't waste them.
- 5
Bring it all together
Drain the linguine and add it straight to the pan with the prawns. Toss everything together over the heat, adding a good splash of that reserved pasta water. The sauce should come together into something glossy and loose, coating every strand without pooling in the bottom of the pan. Squeeze in the lemon juice, scatter the parsley through, and toss once more. Taste it. Season again if it needs it. Serve straight from the pan onto warm plates. Don't let it sit. Pasta waits for no one.
Chef Tips
- •Buy raw prawns, not cooked. Cooked prawns have already given up their flavour to someone else's kitchen. Raw prawns sear properly, release their juices into the pan, and taste sweeter for it. The difference is not small.
- •Use whatever white wine you'd drink. If you wouldn't put it in a glass, don't put it in the pan. It doesn't need to be expensive, but it needs to be dry and honest. A Vermentino or a Muscadet is right for this.
- •A recipe is a conversation, not a contract. If the chilli you've got is mild, use more of it, or add a pinch of dried flakes. If it's fierce, use half. Your kitchen, your rules. Taste the chilli before you slice it and you'll know where you stand.
- •Warm the plates. Two minutes in a low oven. Pasta cools quickly and cold plates steal the heat from it before the first fork is lifted. A small thing that makes a real difference.
Advance Preparation
- •This is not a make-ahead dish. It takes fifteen minutes and it's best eaten the moment it hits the plate. That's part of its charm.
- •You can peel and devein the prawns earlier in the day and keep them covered in the fridge. Slice the garlic and chilli in advance too, if it helps you move faster when the pan is hot.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 375g)
Calories
695 calories
Total Fat
23 g
Saturated Fat
3 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
18 g
Cholesterol
190 mg
Sodium
900 mg
Total Carbohydrates
80 g
Dietary Fiber
4 g
Sugars
4 g
Protein
38 g
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