Ingredients

Serves: 4

White Bean Passitina
Ingredients
Serves: Serves 6

Precooked Beans:
1 1/2 cups dried cannellini beans or other large white beans
1/2 onion
1 celery rib, quartered
1 carrot, quartered
1 clove garlic, peeled and lightly crushed
1 bay leaf
Sea salt, preferably gray salt

2 cloves garlic, peeled and lightly crushed
3 fresh sage leaves
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
½ cup best quality extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt, preferably gray salt, and freshly ground black pepper

FLOUR MIXTURE
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tablespoons California chili powder
1 tablespoon Gray Salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

PISSED OF PRAWNS
2 pounds (16 to 20 count shrimp) about 8 per person, peeled but with the tail on
6 large cloves garlic, thinly sliced
2 Serrano or jalapeno peppers, thinly sliced
1 1/2 cups basil leaves, stemmed and cleaned
1 tablespoon orange zest
Salt and pepper to taste   

Directions

Precook the beans:                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  Place the beans in a saucepan and add cold water to cover by 2 inches. Bring to a boil, cover, and remove from the heat. Let stand for 1 hour, then drain.
Return the beans to the saucepan along with the onion, celery, carrot, garlic, and bay leaf. Add water to cover by 2 inches. Slowly bring to a simmer over moderately low heat. (If you heat them too fast, the skins may break.) Adjust the heat to maintain a bare simmer and cook, uncovered, until the beans are almost tender, 20 minutes or longer, depending on the age of the beans. Saute the sage and sliced garlic on the 3 tbsp olive oil and add to bean and salt to taste and continue cooking until the beans are tender but not mushy. Remove from the heat and let cool in the liquid. (You can prepare the beans to this point 1 to 2 days ahead; cover and refrigerate.)
Drain the liquid from the beans. Measure the beans and put in a blender. Measure half of the volume of the beans with the bean liquid and add liquid to blender. Puree smooth and while machine is running add the ½ cup olive oil. Keep warm                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
FLOUR MIXTURE
Prepare the flour mixture for shrimp: Combine the ingredients and set aside in container.

PISSED OF PRAWNS
Have your fishmonger peel the prawns but leave the tails on for handles.
Season the prawns liberally with salt and pepper.
Preheat a sauté pan on high. Dredge the prawns in the flour mixture. This will give them a nice crust and allow them to stay crispy and fresh at room temperature.
Add olive oil to the pan and put in 1 layer of prawns. You want them to caramelize, so don’t toss or move them. Add a little more oil if the flour absorbs what’s in the pan.
After about 1 minute, turn over the prawns. Let it caramelize, toss and turn out onto a cookie sheet.
Add about 1/4 cup more olive oil to the already hot sauté pan.
Drain pan juices from the cookie sheet into the sauté pan.
Add sliced garlic and let it get light brown. Add chilies and let them get soft. Add the basil and stand back, there’s a lot of water in basil and it will pop. Let it get crispy, less than a minute.
Add the orange zest to the basil/garlic/chile mixture in the sauté pan.
Season with salt and pepper, then spoon the mixture over the prawns.

Plating                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Spoon some of the white bean puree onto the plate and arrange 4 shrimp on top and spoon some of the extra crispy basil mixture on top.