Coconut Shrimp from Mozambique

Ingredients

2-3 lb shrimp
1/4 cup butter (may use part oil)
3-4 cloves garlic, minced
1 small onion, finely chopped
2-3 springs parsley, finely chopped
2 chili peppers, crushed or 1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp salt
2 tsp cumin
2 large tomatoes, chopped
2-3 c coconut milk (see below) (amount depends on amount of shrimp)

Method

Clean and shell shrimp, if not already shelled. Heat butter in a heavy skillet and cook shrimp quickly over moderate heat until a rich golden pink. Remove from pan with slotted spoon, leaving butter.
In the same pan, sauté garlic, onion, parsley and chilis in the butter for 2-3 minutes. Add salt, cumin, and tomatoes, and cook until slightly thickened, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to low, return shrimp to pan and add coconut milk. Stir until heated through. Serve over rice. Makes 4-6 servings.

Coconut Milk

Ingredient: Fresh white meat of 1 coconut

Method

Grate coconut meat by hand, in blender, or in food processor. Line a bowl with a piece of cheesecloth big enough to hang outside the bowl. Place the grated coconut in the center and pour 1 cup boiling water over the coconut. When cool enough to handle, gather up the cloth in a bundle and squeeze the coconut thoroughly, collecting the milky liquid in the bowl. This is the coconut milk. Pour off the coconut milk and save it. Repeat the process three times, but keep each squeezing separate, because the first is the most concentrated. Use this first. If the last one is not used in the shrimp recipe, use it for cooking vegetables or rice.

Source

Adapted from a recipe card promoting The Africa News Cookbook: African Cooking for Western Kitchens edited by Tami Hultman.

Comments

No wonder I saved this card for 25 years; the recipe sounds fantastic. In fact the Amazon ratings for the cookbook, though few, are all 5’s, and the reviewers all praise it highly with no reservations.
On the other hand, no wonder I never made this recipe. Somehow I was never in the mood to go through the labourious process of extracting coconut milk. The recipe doesn’t even mention the part about prying the white meat out of the coconut shell, the hardest job of all.  When the recipe says to repeat the squeezing three times, do you think they mean three times in total or three more times after the first? The Wikipedia article on coconut milk refers to three squeezings, so probably three times altogether.
But with canned coconut milk, it would be easy.
The chili peppers aren’t specified, but since they are supposed to be crushed, I presume it means dried ones.