Making a stir fry with frozen prawns...do I have to defrost them first?

[TheGoddessBlossom]

the recipe says to use frozen prawns, but nowhere in the destructions does it say to defrost them first, do I just bung them in the pan frozen???

[bellavita]

are they raw frozen prawns - if so, then yes I would bung them in the pan frozen.

if they are cooked already, for some reason I have a tendancy to defrost them first and then just warm them through with whatever recipe I am doing ie stirfry, would bung them in after I had done the veg but before the noodles.

[BecauseImWorthIt]

Yes, defrost them first.

The whole point of stir frying is fast, hot cooking. Once you chuck frozen things in the temperature will drop massively and the rest of the stir fry will go soggy rather than staying crunchy.

Also, prawns cook very quickly and if overcooked will go tough. The length of time taken to defrost them in the heat and then cook them through is likely to toughen them as well.

They don't take too long to defrost if you run them under the cold tap. Be careful using the microwave as it is very easy to start to cook them rather than just defrost them

[TheGoddessBlossom]

they are cooked frozen prawns. So if I take them out now when do you think they'd be defrosted by?

[pamplemousse]

Unless you are having stir fry for breakfast you'll be OK getting them out now, they don't take long, 2 hours maybe? Then if you need them just run them under the hot tap, thats what I do anyway, not sure if the recommended way...

[TheGoddessBlossom]

thankyou so much everyone.

Could actually quite happily nail a stir fry right now, and anything else remotely edible for that mattter, am ravenous for some reason, but no, it's for tea tonight...

[Lemontart]

Agree about stir fry and defrosting first. Personally I think Delia and her "cheating" from frozen is wrong. It is fine and safe if you want other parts of the dish steamed/possibly soggy or over cooked as you take longer with temp dropping, but it is not as tasty as fresh/defrosted first.

3 things affect defrosting: weight, temperature and how they are stored while defrosting.
Safest way to defrost is in a fridge - which will limit the final temperature. If using prawns for dinner from deep freezer, I gently bash the bag to loosen them and then pop them in the fridge from first thing in the morning. By late afternoon/early eve they are fully defrosted and still nicely cold in fridge to use. I bring all my stiry fry ingredients out of the fridge for 20 mins to bring up to room temp first in stir frys/currys etc .Much better even result.

[Binx123]

I have brought frozen prawns and defrosted them to cook in stirfry later. However reading the package it says cook from frozen? Do you think they will still be safe to eat?