Sweet potatoes with chargrilled peppers, Chorizo & Prawn

For once in London, we experienced a rare visit from the Sun itself, which decided to bless us with over 20 degrees of heat. if you’re wondering why we’re so obsessed with the weather, let me give you a simple scientific formula for UK weather: for every 4 weeks of rainy cold weather, we’re granted one day of warmth. Therefore, when the Sun comes out like this weekend, most British people don’t know how to act, which is why you see bizarre things like inflatable pools in parks, overcrowded pubs, disposable BBQs, and finally what I’d call overly-ambitious sun bathing.

Enough about the British and our tumultuous relationship with the weather, today I was pretty inspired by the bright skies, so I decided to create a bright, colourful dish full of vegetables, but also flavour. As I try to develop my relationship with food, I have been looking at new techniques to incorporate into my cooking.  This led to me using the method of chargrilling, which gave the dish a light smokey element, which complimented the chorizo. If there's anything I'm realising, when we choose to be more creative in the kitchen,  you can make a lot happen with what you have.

I hope you enjoy this light, yet filling and refreshing dish.

WHAT YOU NEED

• Oven
• Stove
• Chopping board
• Knife
• Teaspoon
• Table spoon
• Sauce pans

INGREDIENTS

• 4 medium sized sweet potatoes
• Salt
• Black pepper
• Chicken stock
• Paprika
• Extra virgin olive oil (I used the Greek oil from Lidl loved it)
• 5 pieces of Garlic
• 2 Chopped chillies
• 1 large Red onion
• 2 Bell peppers
• 100g Chorizo (Recommend the fresh Chorizo from Lidl, it’s super cheap under £2)
• 190g raw King Prawns, deveined

STEPS

1. Pre-heat the oven to 190°C (Fan)
2. Dice the sweet potatoes with the skin on, then drizzle with 1 ½ tbsps. of olive oil, and season with black pepper and salt.
3. Now place in the oven for 40 minutes. After 20 minutes, turn the potatoes around so they bake evenly.
4. Whilst the potatoes are cooking, chargrill the peppers over a fire, as seen in the image below. To do this, hold the pepper over a fire for 10 minutes, constantly rotating. (TIP: For this recipe, you don't want the peppers to be too soft as they'll be fried again later. The purpose of this is to give the dish a smokey flavour).
5. Once charred, de-seed and chop into square pieces. Then put to a side.

Prepping the prawns

1. Finely chop the chilli and garlic. Then put 4 tbsps of olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. once heated, add the garlic and chilli and stir for 30 seconds. Then add the diced chorizo.
2. Now add 1 tsp of paprika into the mix and stir. Then add the prawns and leave them to cook for 2 minutes on each side. Then add some parsley.
3. Once the prawns are ready take them out of the pan and drain out the oil and leave to a side.
4. Using the left-over oil from the chorizo and prawn, heat in a frying pan.
5. Once heated, add half a red onion diced, and sprinkle with salt. Once soft, add the charred peppers, then add half of one chicken stock cube and chilli powder.
6. Now we just need to combine the ingredients, so in a big bowl, add the sweet potatoes, charred peppers, and the prawn and chorizo mix and stir until they’re all combined.
7. To serve, add some raw red onions and drizzle with some lime.

Hope you enjoy!