Skip to footer

Retro prawn cocktail

Prawn, or shrimp, cocktail has been a classic appetizer from decade to decade.

|
Feasting On Art
Classic shrimp cocktail is served with a spicy tomato-based dipping sauce.
|
Feasting On Art
Max Dixon, 'Monument (Prawn),' 2012, courtesy of the artist and Brenda May Gallery, Sydney.

The collages and paintings by Maz Dixon featuring “The Big Things of Australia,” will be featured in the upcoming curated exhibition “Art + Food: Beyond the Still Life” at Brenda May Gallery in Sydney. Beginning in the early 1960s, monumental objects ranging from giant fruit to prawns and pelicans began to litter the landscape of Australia.

Personally, the first “Big Thing” I encountered after moving to Australia was The Big Prawn in Ballina, which was constructed in 1989. In reality, the bubblegum pink crustacean emerges on the horizon of the roadside much in the same way it pokes out of the surf of Dixon’s "Monument (Prawn)." Here the vintage feel of the artwork is echoed in the recipe with the retro-classic, prawn cocktail.

In her artist statement about the work, Maz Dixon writes, “Our view of the landscape is heavily mediated by mass-produced travel ephemera such as maps, souvenirs and postcards.” The small series of paintings and collages in “Art + Food” explore the “gap between a traveller’s expectations and the reality of a place. Using the language of postcards and souvenirs, [Dixon is] going through a process of re-exploration, mapping the many layers of cultural detritus burying the destination.” 

"Monument (Prawn)" can be viewed at Brenda May Gallery starting on Tuesday, Oct. 2, as part of the curated exhibition “Art + Food: Beyond the Still Life.”

Retro Prawn Cocktail
 Yield: 3/4 cup of sauce suitable for around 500 grams (about 1 lb.) of prawns

1/4 cup tomato ketchup
 1/4 cup chili sauce
 2 tablespoons horseradish purée
 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
 2 tablespoons lemon juice
 Dash of Tabasco sauce
 Sea salt and ground pepper to taste

500 grams (about 1lb.) cooked prawns

In a small bowl, mix all of the ingredients well. Serve with cooked prawns. Sauce will keep for up to two weeks in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Related post on Feasting on Art: Shellfish Ceviche

Megan Fizell is the curator of the exhibit “Art + Food: Beyond the Still Life.”

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Retro prawn cocktail
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Food/Stir-It-Up/2012/0920/Retro-prawn-cocktail
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe