Crispy Prawn Burger, Karkalla, Pickled Onions & Miso Mayo

This burger is my favourite recipe to date… it’s bloody delicious.

This November it is all about Australian native ingredients.  These recipes are designed to encourage the use of native ingredients in a way that is a bit more user-friendly and fun than restaurant applications.  This burger is quite honestly one of the best things I have ever tasted. Huge call I know. The umami flavours in the miso mayo let the slightly saltiness of the karkalla pop, while the pickley-goodness of the onions compliment the toasty-sweetness of the crusted prawns – everything just sings in harmony.   

Serves 4

Cook time: 20-30 minutes

Prep Time: 15 minutes

INGREDIENTS

4 Burger buns of your choice

12 medium-large S.A. prawns

300g karkalla

1 or 2 free-range egg whites, cold from the fridge

1 cup of rice flour, or corn flour

Oil for shallow frying

Salt

Mayo

2 free-range eggs

1 tbs miso paste

Squeeze of lemon juice

200 ml neutral oil, like grape seed

Pickled Charred Onions

2 brown onions

400ml white wine vinegar

3 bay leaves

10 peppercorns

4 tbs raw sugar or white sugar

To Serve

Chips (of course)
 

METHOD

Place pickling ingredients (minus the onion) into a saucepan. Bring to a boil and reduce by one third of the original volume.

Meanwhile, heat a pan to high heat. Peel and cut the onions into 1cm slices. With a splash of oil place onions in pan to grill. Try to leave the onion in slices and don’t separate rings, this makes it a bit easier to blacken one side. Allow onion to blacken on each side then place into pickling liquid. Break the rings apart and reserve until plating.

For the mayo; break eggs into a bowl, add miso and lemon juice. Using a bar mix, blend until the ingredients combine. Slowly add the oil in a steady stream allowing the egg mixture to emulsify with the oil. Adjust seasoning by adding more miso if required. I like it to have quite a strong miso flavour, but be careful not to over do it.

Shell your prawns and heat oil in fry pan. Place rice flour in a bowl. In a separate bowl whisk the egg white for about 30 seconds. Dip the prawns in the egg, then the rice flour, shaking of any excess flour before placing in the hot oil to fry.  Repeat with remaining prawns. Season.

Pick down your karkalla but removing any hard stems, leaving the succulent leaves and softer stems. Before serving toss the karkalla through the onion pickling mixture.

To make the burgers add a good slop of the miso mayo on both the top and bottom parts of the bun, top with the karkalla, prawns and onion. EAT!

Notes

Karkalla is a coastal succulent groundcover, native to southern Australia. You can get your hands on karkalla at Something Wild in the Adelaide Central Market.

If you are an overseas/interstate reader and having trouble sourcing karkalla, try butter lettuce instead. It’s not the same, but it’ll do!