This is a classy, zesty, lively dish, the sweet, salty prawns work beautifully with the rich, yet light soup/sauce, and the sweet/sour crunch of croutons. The soup freezes very well

2 of the biggest prawns you can get, shell and heads on

For the red pepper soup

2 big red peppers, preferably Marmaris

100mls Vegetable Nage or Stock

1 dsps olive oil

1 glass (125mls) dry white wine

1 tsp finely grated root ginger

4 cardamom pods, crushed

pinch cayenne pepper

For the garnish

1 tbsp Greek-style yoghurt, ayran, kefir or buttermilk

4 slices of sourdough bread

Dark salad leaves such as baby spinach, rocket etc..

• Put the oven on at 200C. Halve and deseed the peppers, place on a baking tray and bake for 20 mins, till soft and mushy. Then pick off the skin, and put the flesh in the blender

• Meanwhile, peel the prawns, removing the black vein from each tail, and put them back in the fridge. Put the shells and heads in a medium sized baking tray with a little splash of olive oil, and bake in the oven for 8 minutes. They’ll go pink and start to smell lovely. Remove from oven

• Put the prawn shells and heads in a medium saucepan with the ginger, cardamom, cayenne and wine. Bring to a boil, bubble for 2 or 3 minutes, then sieve the juice into the blender along with the peppers. Discard the heads and shells.

• Add the vegetable nage to the pepper stock in the blender then whizz till very smooth, then decant back into a small saucepan, and set aside

• When you’re ready to serve, heat the pepper soup till just warm, and get the bread toasting. Then fry the prawns in a hot frying pan until just done. Once the bread is toasted, cut it into 2cm pieces

• To serve, place 2 to 3 ladles of soup on each of the soup plates, then add the fried prawns and scatter with the croutons. Drizzle with yoghurt and serve with salad leaves