King prawns in pandanus leaves

1. To prepare the sauce, Daniel Gendre of Aphrodite Restaurant combines 150g red chili, three cloves of garlic, 30g ginger, 40g galangal, 10g turmeric and seven pcs shallot, and finely crushes the ingredients. He stir-fries the spices in 50ml cooking oil until fragrant and then pours in 200ml chicken stock and allows to simmer. He adds two sticks of lemon grass, 10g brown sugar, 150ml coconut milk, salt and pepper. He sieves the sauce and keeps it warm.

2. To prepare the prawns for four servings, Gendre uses 16 king prawns (headless and cleaned) and marinates them with 1 tsp lemon juice, 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce and sets them aside for 10 minutes. He cuts four to six pandanus leaves into two- centimeter-wide bands and blanches them in hot water. He gently wraps the king prawns in the leaves and secures with toothpicks before deep frying them in hot oil. To make the rice, Gendre melts 40g unsalted butter in a frying pan and stirs in 20g roasted pine nuts and 400g cooked rice. He seasons with salt and pepper and sautes for two to three minutes.

3. To serve, Gendre places one dome of buttered rice in the center of a hot plate and arranges four king prawns around the rice dome. He gently pours the spicy coconut sauce around the dome and adds 10g sweet soya to the sauce and creates artistic patterns using a toothpick. Finally, he tops the rice with 10g leek, 10g red chili and four coriander leaves. (Maria Endah Hulupi)