I’m going to date myself, but 40 years ago, when I was a third year chef’s apprentice, the head chef at the hotel I worked at entrusted me with creating special dinner menus for that business’s upscale restaurant. It was a three-course offering and a supplemental to the restaurant’s regular menu.
When coming up with those menus, if I had opted for a main-course that was rich and heavy in style, I balanced that by choosing a starting dish that was lighter in style. When that dish was a soup, I sometimes served consommé.
Consommé, of course, is the classic French-style, light and clear soup that can be made with beef, chicken, fish or seafood stock or broth. It can be garnished in various ways, depending on the type of consommé you are making.
To clarify the soup and make it clear, you need to, in a pot, combine cold stock or broth with an unimpressive-looking egg white and vegetable mixture that might also have ground meat in it, depending on the type of consommé you are making. When you heat the soup and bring it to a gentle simmer, that mixture binds together, rises to the surface and forms what chefs call a “cap.” That cap pulls the impurities out of the stock or broth below it and makes it clear. The soup is then strained.
I used that technique for today’s prawn consommé recipe where the shells from the prawns and some of their meat, which was minced, was also added to the egg white mixture infusing the soup with their inviting prawn flavour.
There are a few steps required to make the consommé, but it can be prepared a day in advance, cooled and then reheated and served when needed. It, as noted, is a lighter soup you could serve before a heavier main-course, such as that prime rib you might have for New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day dinner.
Prawn Consommé
I like serving this decadent clear soup, stocked with pieces of prawn meat, as a starter on a special occasion, such as New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day dinner.
Preparation time: 45 minutes
Cooking time: 23 to 28 minutes
Makes: six (about one cup each) servings
7 1/2 cups chicken or fish broth or stock (divided; see Note)
16 large, raw, shell-on prawns (divided; see Note)
1/2 cup white wine
1/4 cup finely diced carrot
1/4 cup finely diced onion
1/4 cup finely diced celery
1 large garlic clove, halved and thinly sliced
3 large egg whites
1 bay leaf
1/8 tsp ground turmeric (to add a golden hue to the consommé)
• salt and ground white pepper, to taste
1 green onion, cut into thin, 1-inch strips, or 1 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
Place two cups of the broth (or stock) in a nine-inch skillet and bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Add 12 of the prawns, return to a simmer, and cook two minutes, or until prawns are just cooked through. Remove skillet from the heat. Lift prawns out of the skillet with tongs, let drain and then set on a wide plate and let cool until safe enough to handle. Pour the broth in the skillet into a six-inch or so tall stockpot with a six-to eight-inch diameter base. Add the wine and remaining five and a half cups of stock, and then set the pot aside for now.
When the prawns have cooled, peel them. Put the shells from the prawns into a medium bowl. Cut each cooked, peeled prawn, widthwise, in half (see Eric options). Set back on the plate, cover and refrigerate until needed.
Peel the remaining four raw prawns and set their shells in the bowl, too. Set the raw prawn meat on a cutting board and with a sharp knife, finely chop them until they have a ground meat like consistency.
Add the chopped prawn meat, carrot, onion, celery, garlic, egg white, bay leaf and turmeric to the shells in the bowl and mix well to combine and coat everything with the egg whites. Stir the egg white mixture into the pot with the stock and wine.
Set the pot over medium-high heat. Cook, stirring regularly, until the mixture comes to a gentle simmer. (Small bubbles should just break on the surface. Do not allow it to boil, or the consommé will not become clear). The moment it reaches a gentle simmer, stop stirring and adjust the heat so the soup maintains that gentle simmer. Gently simmer, uncovered, 20 to 25 minutes, or until the ingredients you mixed form a cap on top of the consommé and when you peak underneath it the liquid is clear.
Set a fine mesh strainer over another pot. Tip the pot holding the consommé; the liquid will rise over the “cap” on the lower side. Use a ladle to carefully scoop out the clear broth and strain it through the sieve into the other pot. Tip the pot more and more as you get near the end of straining the consommé. (The consommé can be made to this stage a day in advance. After cooling it to room temperature, cover and keep it and the cooked prawns refrigerated until needed.)
To serve, bring the consommé back to a simmer and season with salt and white pepper. Divide the halved, cooked prawns between six heated soup bowls and sprinkle in the green onions (or parsley). Ladle in the simmering consommé and serve.
Note 1: I used Pacific Foods brand low sodium chicken broth when testing this recipe. It’s sold in the prepared soup/stock aisle of most supermarkets.
Note 2: I used raw, large, shell-on Argentine wild red prawns when testing this recipe. They are sold at many supermarkets. I bought them frozen and a 454-gram bag yielded the prawns needed here, plus a few more. I thawed the ones I needed for the consommé, and kept the other ones frozen for another use. Other types of large prawns will also work here.
Eric options: Instead of setting halved, cooked prawns in each bowl of consommé, I cut the prawns into small pieces and divided them among the bowls before pouring in the soup.
Eric Akis is the author of eight cookbooks. His columns appear in the Life section Wednesday and Sunday.
