Linguine with lemony prawns, chorizo and wild garlic pesto

I always have a big bag of raw, frozen prawns in the freezer for when I want a speedy meal. 

Ingredients 

Linguine or whatever pasta you have

Wild garlic and hazelnut pesto - recipe on the blog (you can use any green pesto though)

1 tbsp olive oil

Chilli flakes

Half a lemon

Hard cheese

Raw, frozen prawns 

About 1 inch chorizo sausage, sliced. 

Dash of white wine/ white wine vinegar

Method

Defrost the prawns.  Marinate them in chilli flakes, lemon, lemon juice and oil. 

Put some linguine (or any pasta you have) in some salted, boiling water. 

Dry fry some chorizo until it renders some fat. 

Add the marinated prawns and any marinade. Add a dash of white wine vinegar (if I'd had an open bottle of white wine, I would have used that)

When the prawns turn pink add a handful of grated cheese (I used grana padano but Parmesan fine too). 

Add some pasta cooking water and stir. It'll make a nice creamy sauce. Turn off the heat. 

When the pasta is cooked, stir the pesto into it.  Don't drain all the water. It's nicer if it's still a bit wet. 

Stir some grated cheese into the pasta. 

Add everything from the frying pan into the pasta. Stir. 

Top with a mix of crunchy breadcrumbs ( see tip below), finely grated cheese and chilli flakes. 

Tip:

Whenever I have bread that is going to go bad, I whizz it up into breadcrumbs. I then cook them in the oven on a low heat until they are all dried. Then I keep them in sterilised jars in the cupboard. 

They are so handy. They can be used to add to dishes to make them go further, for breading fish or chicken, fish cakes, as a topping to fish pie/ cottage pies, the list goes on... They're a great store cupboard ingredient.