A fast, garlicky prawn pasta with no tomato in sight, sharpened with lemon zest and a fistful of parsley.
Prep
12 mins
Cook
15 mins
Servings
4
Per serving
£2.63
Difficulty
easy
The trick here is cooking the prawns for barely two minutes and building the sauce around them rather than the other way round. Lemon zest goes in at the end so it stays bright instead of turning bitter.
Bring a large pan of well-salted water to the boil and start the linguine, cooking it one minute short of the packet time.
While it cooks, warm 3 tablespoons of the oil in a wide frying pan over a medium-low heat. Add the garlic and chilli and cook gently for 2 minutes until the garlic smells sweet and is just turning pale gold. Do not let it brown.
Raise the heat, add the prawns in a single layer and cook for 1 minute a side, until they have just turned pink and opaque. Lift them onto a plate.
Pull the prawns out while they still look slightly underdone. They finish cooking in the sauce.
Pour the wine into the pan and let it reduce by half, scraping up anything stuck to the base.
Drain the pasta, reserving a mugful of water, and tip it into the pan with the prawns, lemon zest, lemon juice, parsley and the last tablespoon of oil. Toss over a low heat for a minute, loosening with cooking water until glossy.
Season and serve at once, while the lemon is still sharp.