A question for seafood lovers or chefs.

**POD** · 31st August 2017, 06:45 PM

What is it with restaurants leaving the tails on prawns? I can never figure out why, when there are prawns in a sauce or in some kind of dish, I am expected to wrestle the tails off the things. Or am I expected to eat them, like fingernails? It's bad enough on something like a seafood platter, where the prawns are at least accessible and 'clean', but several times recently I have had something like a spaghetti marinara, where the prawns are sunk deep in the food, and have had to fiddle with the darn things and then find somewhere to put the detritus. Is there some kind of culinary doctrine that states that the tail should stay on, or have chefs got lazy?

**donh54** · 31st August 2017, 07:01 PM

Used to be left on for a "handle" when eating them. Pick them up by the tail end, and when the other end is safely in the gob, squeeze the end, and voila! No slippery fingers.
As for buried ones, that sounds like laziness

**CraigE** · 1st September 2017, 07:58 AM

Labour / Laziness, that simple. They all try to say it is a fancy way of doing the prawns, rubbish. I get leaving the tips of the tale on, but more and more are serving up the tail intact with shell.
If I want that will just go and buy an amount of whole cooked prawns.
Having said that it is a pain peeling prawns for 300 plus customers a day, same with crays. I used to detest Christmas when cooking, 300-400 crays to do, usually ending up with blue hands from the poison in the spiked and thousands of prawns for assorted dishes.

**NavyDiver** · 1st September 2017, 08:25 AM

I sort of agree but hate dried out peeled prawns and the shell helps retain the juice and flavour. As long as a hand wash bowl of water and lemon juice is available I dig in. If not I tend to try my knife shelling skills.

I always cook my crays in the shell and cut them afterwards. Had some BBQ cray tail at a restaurant last year. It was cut in half. the meat which was on the grill was over cooked, middle slightly and only the meat on the shell was perfect in my view.

**Roverlord off road spares** · 1st September 2017, 09:53 AM

Originally Posted by CraigE

I used to detest Christmas when cooking, 300-400 crays to do, .

Did you have armed security guards surrounding you, that's a lot of Big $$$$ all in one place.

**loanrangie** · 1st September 2017, 10:51 AM

Also one of my pet hates as a chef i always preferred to remove all but the last section of the tail so at least you have a handle.

**weeds** · 1st September 2017, 11:13 AM

Where possible I have seafood without sauce.....same with meat

When I have dishes where the prawns still have the tail I just eat the whole lot, adds a bit of crunch.

**gofish** · 1st September 2017, 03:14 PM

Don't be upset they left the tail on.......be hopeful they removed the "poo-shoot"

**CraigE** · 1st September 2017, 05:36 PM

Originally Posted by gofish

Don't be upset they left the tail on.......be hopeful they removed the "poo-shoot"

Why that is the sauce, I used to remove commercially but mostly if peeling my own don't bother.

**Zeros** · 2nd September 2017, 02:08 PM

Shellfish cooked in the shell retains juiciness and develops a more complex flavour. Whether it's a stock or a sauce or on the grill. Prawns in the shell taste better and are also more likely to be fresh. I'd much rather peel them myself at the table.

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