I remember cooking this the first time to try it out. It wasn’t at my place – it was at my friend, Frances’s place. We both wanted to try something different but at that time I was in college and I couldn’t afford to buy shrimps. So I told my friend to buy the shrimps and I’ll bring the ingredients.
Since I’m impatient, I like recipes and food that takes less than 30 minutes to prepare and cook. This is one of them. If you bought the shrimps in a dampa or supermarket, you could try to ask them to clean it for you – that is to cut off the spike, antenna and legs.
Since people have different tastes, this recipe has spawned different variants. I will mention them towards the end.
Now for the ingredients:
- 1 kilo tiger prawn shrimps
- 500 ml Royal True Orange or RTO *
Yes, it is a long list. 😉
Instructions:
After cleaning the shrimps, heat the wok. Put in the shrimps, add Royal True Orange and once it boils, mix and turn the stove off. You can also make it boil a little bit longer so that the juices seeps into the sauce, making it thicker and tastier.
The result is a sweet-salty shrimp with a hint of orange flavor.
Now for the variations:
With garlic and butter. Add the garlic and butter AFTER sauce boils. This way, the garlic and butter taste won’t be overpowered by the soda. If you wish for a stronger garlic flavor, you can saute the shrimp in garlic and butter, add 250ml of soda, boil then add garlic and butter after.
With garlic and catsup. Yes, some people want it red-orange. You add the catsup once the soda boils. People have debated between banana catsup and tomato catsup – I leave it to you to experiment on that.
Deveined and peeled. Some people don’t like the experience of peeling their shrimps. The taste is more subtle and this cooks much faster. Use only 250ml. Also, since it is peeled, you might have to add salt to taste.
*Â Since the local convenience store doesn’t always carry RTO, I tried Mirinda and it left a fake orange taste. I also tried Sprite and powdered orange juice – Tang (mix it before put it in). The result was a sweeter version. I’ve also tried Sprite with orange zest. That one is good too.
