Vapor Cafe

I’m Nick Hamman and I’m looking for the best prawns in South Africa and today your comments have sent me here to Vapor in Morning Side Durban. It’s a popular, halaal-certified, American styled diner and hookah lounged, celebrated all over down for its seafood and in particular the massive Godfather Prawns. Here they come generously sized, plump and served with chips or rice and a choice of peri-peri or lemon butter sauces.

This dish, in front of Hammy one’s boi is called the Giovanni Brusca, and yes named after the notorious former Sicilian mafia hitman. The whole menu is built around Mafia and gangster-themed names. You’ll see dishes named after figures like Al Capone, John Gotti, Sammy the Bull, The Gambino, The Sopranos, Scarface and Salvatore Toto.

Easy to cook, high in protein with a naturally sweet, umami-rich flavor prawns are among the most eaten seafood by us humans on earth. Our prehistoics ancestors gathered them along the shoreline, the greeks, romans and Egyptians had recipes for their preservation more than 2000 years ago, and today we consume around 8–9 billion kilograms of them every year

Here, if you want to suck them down, you’re going to pay R445 for this platter.

And at that price, you’d better hope they’re packing something special.

Thankfully, they are.

These aren’t the shy little prawns hiding at the bottom of a seafood basket. No, these are absolute units. Thick. Meaty. Curved in all the right places. The kind that arrive at the table and immediately have everybody looking.

I went for the peri-peri, because life’s too short for safe choices.

The first one slides out of its shell with almost no resistance at all. Firm, juicy flesh carrying just enough smokiness from the grill before the peri-peri kicks in and starts getting a little bit naughty.

I would highly recommend trying out Vapor Lounge for yourself and have left the details in the caption, but if these are not the best prawns in South Africa, I need you to let me know in the comments where I’m going next

Read our disclaimer about Halal restaurants here.

#seafood #prawns #halaal