Prawn Fritters With Courgettes (Keto, Gluten Free or Low Fat)

A delicious crispy prawn fritters recipe that is keto, gluten free. They're packed with vegetables like courgettes and carrots, fresh herbs and can be enjoyed as a side or a main. Includes step by step images.

I recently stumbled across a bulk load of precooked small cocktail prawns on offer and didn't want to miss out. Especially as prawns (or any skinless fish) are perfect for protein on a low fat unofficial Slimming World plan or a low carb Keto diet alongside healthy fats.

If it swims, it slims! Heard of it? It's perfect for healthy fritters!

I've also got an obsession with courgettes (zucchini), so thought, why not put it all together? The result? These really tasty shrimp fritters! I love them, so I'm going to show you how I make them, too.

What Are Fritters?

Firstly, let's talk about fritters. What are they, even? Well, it's a latin word meaning "a fry". And what I feel is quite common for fritter ingredients is, a meat, vegetable or fruit that is encased in a batter, like flour and egg, or breaded before frying.

There are so many different types fritters (and patties) and you can find them in many different cuisines. Such as:

• Apple fritters, which are encased in batter and deep-fried
• Potato fritters, which similarly to this courgette fritters recipe, are grated
• Broccoli fritters with parmesan
• Vegan lentil fritters

Note, you'll find a Chinese prawn fritters recipe is very different (AKA Cucur Udang Mamak). This is a deep fried prawns recipe, making them into balls.

But, pretty much all of battered prawns can be made as oven baked fritters as well as pan-fried in a nutritious oil or Fry Light. As far prawn dishes go, these could even be called a mini prawn omelette!

Also, you may like to try my keto mackerel fish cakes using coconut flour and ground almonds!

Equipment I Used to Make Prawn Fritters

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• Food processor
• Measuring cups
• Weighing scales
• Measuring spoons
• Frying pan
• Spatula
• Chopping knife
• Chopping board
• Salt and pepper grinder
• Mixing bowl

How to Make Easy Vegetable Fritters With Prawns

If you're looking for the full list of ingredients, you can find my printable fried prawn fritters recipe towards the bottom of this page. But, in a nutshell, here's how I make my shrimp fritters recipe.

Note, feel free to be more flexible with your favourite herbs and spices. For example, you might want to increase chilli, add curry powder, etc to make an extra spicy prawn fitters recipe.

1. Use a food processor to shred courgettes, carrots and onion and set aside. I also like calling them rainbow fritters as the colour is beautiful!
2. In a separate mixing bowl, beat the eggs, then mix in fresh herbs of your choice. I'm using fennel fronds, but anything strong you love will do.
3. Combine 1 and 2 and mix well. I cheated and used my Kitchen Aid mixer as it was at hand.
4. Now mix everything else in, except the coconut oil and prawns.
5. Stir in the oat flour until combined. See note below regarding other flours.
6. Fold in the prawns. See note below on types of prawns you can use.
7. Add the coconut oil to a non stick frying pan and heat to medium/high heat, or spray with Fry Light. See note below regarding Fry Light.
8. Spoon out 4 heaped tablespoons, spaced apart in to the frying pan and flatten to spread out.
9. Fry each side of you prawn cakes for 3 minutes until golden and stack on a plate and repeat until you have no batter mix for prawns left!

Substitution Ideas

Note, if you don't have carrots, then why not try prawn and sweet potato fritters along with courgettes? If you don't have courgettes, increase the amount of other veg you use.

Oat Flour Substitutes

If you want to use a different flour to oat flour, please note that it is significantly lighter than plain flour. Therefore, if measuring cups, you'll need to use 1 & ¼ cups of all purpose flour if not needing a Gluten Free prawn fritter recipe. Note, it is like for like when weighing.

How to Cook Prawns in Zucchini Fritters

Cooking prawns from raw can be quite daunting if you're squeamish. So I try to use precooked prawns where possible as there's no need for a fancy prawn peeler. Nor are there any beady eyes to stare back at.

How to Prepare Raw Or Shelled Cooked Prawns

• Twist and pull the head off
• Shell the prawns by cracking from its belly
• Remove the tail by pinching and pulling
• To de-vein, run a sharp knife along its back and pull it away in one piece

Cooking Fritters With Raw Prawns

If you've prepped your raw prawns as above, you can mix them straight into the prawn batter and follow the rest of this recipe.

Just make sure your prawn fritters are cooking all the way through. Also note, with big freshwater prawns, you will probably want to chop them up a bit. With king prawns, it size will probably be just right to work with.

Why Are My Prawn Fritters Sticking To the Pan?

There's nothing worse than courgette fritters and the like are sticking to your frying pan when you're frying to turn them over. If you find this is you, you may find:

• The nonstick in your frying pan is no longer as good as it used to be. For example, some people complain Fry Light ruins their pans.
• You're using oil with a low smoke point. I love frying with unrefined coconut oil as it has a higher smoke point of approximately 400 degrees. And it add a delicious flavour like a thai prawn fritters recipe!

How Long Can You Keep Fritters in the Fridge?

Normally, vegetable fritters should keep for up to a week in the fridge, covered. However, with these being courgette and prawn fritters, ideally, they should be allowed to cool and stored in the fridge within the hour. And then kept in the fridge for up to 3 days.

Can I Freeze Prawn Fritter Batter?

I've never tried to freeze batter, but due to courgettes possibly going soft of mushy, I would fry a batch first, then freeze them.

For easy access, store in an airtight container with sheets of baking paper between each one, then for up to 3 months. Defrost completely before reheating as follows below.

Can You Reheat Prawn Fritters?

You can either reheat prawn fritters in the microwave, oven, or in a frying pan. But you must make sure they're piping hot to avoid food poisoning. To be safe, I only reheat what I know I'm going to eat and avoid reheating prawns twice.

How to Grate Your Vegetables Without a Food Processor

If you don't have a food processor to shred your vegetables speedily, you could try:

• Use a hand held grater (obviously)
• Finely slice or dice your veggies
• Use a potato peeler and slice slithers

What Goes With Fritters?

You may prefer to enjoy this tasty prawn fritters recipe as a healthy side or main where they're the star of the show. I choose to treat them as a prawn salad recipe with a handful of leafy greens, red onion, olives and a Keto salad dressing.

Other side dishes you could eat with them are:

• Cooked rice or cauliflower rice
• Cous cous
• Mac and cheese (or cauliflower mac and cheese)
• Steamed vegetables
• Garlic mushrooms
• Courgetti noodles
• Healthy dirty fries

Are The Prawn Cakes Healthy?

At around 80 calories each, I think they're very healthy. Particularly as it uses healthy fats for frying, packed with vegetables and oat flour, which is high in fibre.

If you wanted to make them lower in fat, you could lay spoonfuls on the mixture onto a baking tray silicone baking mat.

If making them as deep fried prawn fritters, they would be higher in calories and fat. This is OK for a keto diet, but is less likely to suit a Slimming club diet.

More Easy Prawn Recipes

• Easy Prawn Curry
• Healthy chilli prawn linguine
• Prawn soup
• Slimmer's fish pie
• Note, many more of my recipes can easily be adapted by stirring in cooked prawns!

How to Make This Easy Prawn Fritters Recipe

📖 Recipe