One of the great things about chicken is that you can put a variety of flavours with it. Chicken and seafood is well established, particularly chicken with lobster. This spicy blackened Cajun chicken and more mellow, but slightly bitter, large prawns make this dish a wonderful taste sensation. A really easy and quick recipe.
Ingredients for 2 people;
2 skinless chicken breasts
6 large prawns, peeled & deveined with heads on
330 ml generic beer
100 g butter
cajun spices (either homemade or shop bought)
To make your own Cajun spices you will need – dried onion, dried garlic, ground coriander, paprika, cayenne pepper, ground Jamaican allspice, celery salt, ground ginger, salt & black pepper. It is almost impossible to give exact quantities of each but roughly speaking the earlier in the list then the greater the quantity you will need. Mix all the ingredients together in either a spice blender or pestle & mortar.
Dip the chicken breasts in the Cajun spices making sure they are thoroughly coated.
In a heavy bottomed skillet pan melt about 70 g of the butter until it starts to smoke. Carefully place the chicken in the pan. Cook on each side for about 2 minutes then transfer the chicken to a baking sheet and place in a preheated oven at 200C for about 10 minutes until the chicken is cooked. Don’t put the skillet pan in the oven, it is so hot that it will burn the chicken.
While the chicken is cooking let’s poach the shrimp. In a pan over medium heat melt the remaining butter with some of the Cajun spices, add the prawns and toss to cover them. Add enough beer to cover the prawns and gently bring to the boil. Let the prawns poach for 3-4 mins.
Assemble the dish and serve with potato wedges, salad, cornbread, mayonnaise or aioli.
