Prawn & noodle salad with crispy shallots

Name: Prawn & noodle salad with crispy shallots
Prep time: 9 min
Cook time: 17 min
Total time: 26 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Vietnamese
Ingredients: 200g Rice Noodles; 200g Prawns; 1 sliced Red Onions; 1 sliced Red Chilli; 1 sliced Cucumber; Handful Coriander; Handful Mint; 2 tablespoons Roasted Peanut; Juice of 3 Lime; 1 tablespoon Brown Sugar; 2 tsp Fish Sauce; 1 clove peeled crushed Garlic; 5 Slices Shallots; For frying Vegetable Oil; Sprinkling Flour

By The Spice & Simmer Kitchen · Published May 3, 2026

A one-pot Seafood recipe with Vietnamese flavors, built for busy weeknights when you want real food without a sink full of dishes. Comes together in roughly 49 minutes, serves about 4, and uses ingredients you can find at any normal grocery store. The technique is simple: build a base in your pot, layer in the main ingredients, simmer until everything has had time to talk to each other, and serve straight from the pan. If you're cooking for picky eaters, this one tends to land — the flavors are recognizable, the texture is comforting, and there's nothing weird hiding in the ingredient list. Perfect for the kind of evening where you want dinner on the table by 7pm and the kitchen empty by 7:30.

Ingredients

Makes 4 servings · 26 min total

200g Rice Noodles
200g Prawns
1 sliced Red Onions
1 sliced Red Chilli
1 sliced Cucumber
Handful Coriander
Handful Mint
2 tablespoons Roasted Peanut
Juice of 3 Lime
1 tablespoon Brown Sugar
2 tsp Fish Sauce
1 clove peeled crushed Garlic
5 Slices Shallots
For frying Vegetable Oil
Sprinkling Flour

Step-by-step instructions

step 1.
For the crispy shallots, heat 5cm of oil until hot in a wok. You will know the oil is hot enough when one piece of shallot sizzles as soon as it’s dropped in. Toss the shallot slices with flour, shake off excess and fry in the oil until golden. They fry quickly, about 1 min. Drain on kitchen paper, sprinkle with salt and set aside.
step 2.
To make the dressing, mix the lime juice, sugar, fish sauce and garlic and set aside. In a large mixing bowl, pour boiling water over the noodles. Leave them for 2 mins or until they are just cooked, then rinse under cold water. Drain well, shaking the sieve numerous times to get out the excess water, then place back in the bowl. Add prawns, onion, chilli, cucumber and herbs. Pour the dressing over, mix, then sprinkle with the shallots and peanuts.

Why this works on a weeknight

Prawn & noodle salad with crispy shallots genuinely fits a 30-minute weeknight window, which is why it earned a spot in our Stir-Fry collection. The technique is forgiving, the ingredient list is grocery-store standard, and the active cooking time is short enough that you can answer a text message in the middle without ruining dinner.

Cleanup notes

This is a single-pan recipe, so the cleanup is exactly one pan, one cutting board, and one knife. While the dish rests, fill the pan with hot soapy water — by the time you are done eating, the residue lifts off with a single pass of a sponge. Skip the steel wool on cast iron; a stiff brush and warm water are all you need to keep the seasoning intact.

Make-ahead and leftovers

Leftovers keep covered in the fridge for up to three days. Reheat in a dry pan over medium-low with a splash of water or stock to loosen the sauce. Prawn & noodle salad with crispy shallots actually improves overnight as the flavors keep talking to each other, so doubling the recipe and packing tomorrow's lunch is a high-leverage weeknight move.

Filed under 🥢 Stir-Fry Seafood Vietnamese ⚡ 30-Min Dinner