Some ingredients need very little help. The Rossi prawns from Malta’s south coast are one of them: sweet, delicate and best eaten raw. This dish is built entirely around them, and it captures our zero-waste approach on a single plate.
Each prawn is brined, rolled and sliced, turning it into something silky. A jelly that tastes of the open sea goes on top, followed by a few drops of fig leaf oil, made from local fig leaves foraged by our head of sustainability, Keith Abela. Then comes the sauce: buttermilk and mussel stock, with smoked pike perch roe bringing a savoury hit of smoke.
Once the prawns are prepared, the rest of them is also utilised. The tips become a crisp cracker served alongside the prawns. The claws are dried and ground into a fine, intensely flavoured powder to season the crisps. The remaining shells go into the foaming sauce for our red bream dish. One ingredient, used from head to tail, across two dishes.
That’s how we cook at ION Harbour: begin with the best of what Malta’s waters offer, treat it with care, and let nothing go to waste.
