The Ceviche Rule - Crab II

In the midst of all this crab, I have long wanted to make crab ceviche.

The first time I tried I thought I'd go with all-the-way-raw crab.  There is one extremely major problem with that.  As far as I can tell, there is no way to get raw crab meat, in any significant amount, out of the shell.  How do I know this?  Bitter, bitter, frustrating experience.  The meat of the crab holds on to the interior of the shell with startling tenacity.

Blanch.  Blanching is my friend (and yours too).  Relax that angry crab, and get yourself what you need to make crab ceviche instead of killing yourself for about 5 chips worth.

I admit it looks good,
but you are looking at
about 1/5 of the whole thing!

Now ceviche is one of those things that can be done tons of ways.  But as long as you follow a few basic rules, you can mix and match ingredients based on what's on hand, and what you like best.

1st - the Crab Ceviche recipe and then 2nd a general rule for ceviche in general.

Dungeness Crab Ceviche

Ingredients:
1 dungeness crab
1 shallot (or 1/4 of a small purple onion)
2 garlic cloves
1 red jalapeño pepper
4-5 limes and/or lemons
1/2 avocado
handful herbs - cilantro, basil parsley are my faves.
salt to taste

Equipment:
crab cracker, or kitchen shears
knife
cutting board
medium glass or ceramic bowl
citrus reamer (or other juice extracting device)
spoon

Prep:
Get an inch of water to boil in a covered pot big enough to easily hold your crab.  Pop in your crab for a steam.  2 min for a pre-cleaned crab 3.5 min for a whole crab.  This won't cook the crab through, but will cook the meat enough to remove it easily.  Remove the crab and set it aside to cool.

Cut the lemons/limes in half, and get the juice out - you are looking for about 3/4 cup.

Use the cracker and a couple of the pointy toes to liberate the crab from the shell.  Get the cartilage and shell out.

About 1.5C crab.
If you don't have dungeness, you'll need more than 1 crab 

Add the citrus juice to the crab, and let it sit for 30 - 90 minutes.

Cook:
Cube the avocado half (Check this HINT! out for picking out a good one, and making it look nice.)

Cut up all your other ingredients small.

Remove the white ribs and the seeds from the chili if you don't want lots of spice.  (Leave some in for some kick.  Careful about overpowering the crab.)
Stir together all the plant ingredients.  Add the cooked crab.  Then add enough juice to balance the flavors.  Make sure there is enough salt to make the flavors taste great, but not so it tastes salty.

I love serving mine on corn chips (as you may have noticed...)

Bonus Note:  If all you can find is that "pasteurized" or fresh picked crab, just stir all the goodies together and serve - INSTANTLY.  (You won't need as much lime juice.)

The Ceviche Rule
Ceviche works for seafood generally since it tends to have little or no fat incorporated in the muscle (meat).  You'll notice there is never "xxx-belly" ceviche.  And if you do ever see it, run the other way.  The acid in ceviche (the citrus) denatures or cooks the proteins, but does snap-all for fat.  And there are few times we westerners dig cold animal fat, much less wet, sour animal fat.

So - whatever seafood you have, here are the rules you need to follow to wow your friends, or cook something awfully nice for yourself.

basics ingredients:
for 1lb fish and/or shellfish

1C citrus juice
2 cloves garlic - minced
about 3 Tbs finely chopped onion (purple or sweet is best)
finely diced chili to taste
salt to taste

accessories - extras many people like.

a splash of oil to smooth things out
tomatoes
avocados
torn or chiffonade herbs (cilantro, basil, parsley)
spicer chilies or a dash of a vinegary hot sauce
cilantro, basil, parsley or other herbs

"cooking" time:

raw fish - 1/4" cube about 1 - 2 hours
                1/2" cube about 2 - 4 hours

same with scallops, conch, whatever you decide to go with.
(psst - whole clams and oysters won't work - too many things that aren't muscle - don't do that to yourself)

not really worth doing larger bits, but if you want to - soak it until it is firm.
And if you want to soak it longer - it may get a little hard.  Careful.

If you want to stop the soaking, but it's not serving time yet, pour off the citrus juice, let the fish hang out with the other stuff, and then add back in a little juice at serving time.  Keep it cold!

blanched shellfish (crabs, lobster, shrimp)

soak about an hour, but check at 30 minutes.
Depending on the size of your pieces, it may not take the whole time.
Again - a little extra time in the juice isn't going to hurt anything, but leaving it in there forever will make it too firm, and you'll likely lose the seafood flavor.  So if it before serving time, just keep it cold out of the juice until serving time.



Keep these proportions - and mix in what else you like - you'll be in great shape.

Five Spice Garlic Crab - on a Boat

Ever have that wok-fried, still in the shell, spicy garlic crab at a Chinese restaurant?

I have, twice.  This is not the sort of thing your average, neighborhood, week-night, take-out joint is going to have.  First of all, this doesn't take out. Second, it has to be done with fresh, live crab.  It doesn't work anywhere near as well if you just douse already cooked crab with the flavors.  And it should be eaten as soon at you can handle the crab.

What I'm trying to say is, getting this at a restaurant is kind of an event.  Just finding a restaurant that makes this specialty is an important start.  And then getting there may be an ordeal.  (The second time I got my hands on such a specialty was in Boston's China Town.  So yes, getting to the restaurant was something of an ordeal.)  And both these restaurants were well known for their food - and thus required a reservation, or an ocean of patience for a walk-in table, if that had even been available.

But if you find yourself with a decently large burner on a boat (or kitchen that is crab adjacent), a wok-ish pan, 

There's the pan on my awesome Force-10 stove

(mine's a sauce pan/sauté pan cross that kinda works like a wok), enough oil, a head of garlic, salt and some Five-Spice powder, when you pull up some crabs - well then nothing could be easier.  

Well, throwing them back is easier, and steaming them whole is easier, and so is building a small IKEA bookshelf.  But it is totally doable.

I suppose you can also round up the same ingredients at home, and pick up 2 live Dungeness crabs at the fish market/counter, but where's the sense of adventure?  OK, I will concede live crabs in the kitchen is pretty adventurous.

So how does this go down?

You need some decent crab-handling skills, though rubber-banded claws help.  For a quick video on how to clean live crabs, check out this earlier post. (crab dispatching - boat optional, a dock or deck edge or  railing actually works better.)

Once the crab is split and cleaned, Use scissors or a cleaver (or your bare hands... grrrrrrrrr!) to cut the crab legs into segments at the joints.

Discard the pointy tip toes - they have no meat - or not enough to pursue.

Though the toes make great tools for picking out meat if you don't have picks.

Try to cut the joints cleanly to minimize this:

Try to keep the meat IN the shell so it doesn't get overcooked

Chop/cut the cleaned, de-legged body into 4-6 chunks. 

The shell is pretty thin, you can snip around if
cutting it like this seems to crush the body.

Then follow this recipe:

Five Spice Garlic Wok Fried Crab

Ingredients:

1 - 2 Dungeness Crabs* cleaned and cut up as described above.

1 head garlic

1-2 tsp Chinese five-spice powder

1/2 tsp salt
several grinds black pepper

1/4 C oil

Equipment:

Wok or other large bowl shaped pan

Large stirring spatula

Slotted spoon

Paper towels

(Tongs)

Serving platter

Crab cracking device (nut crackers and pliers work in an emergency)

Prep:

Set the cleaned, split crab to the side.  Break up the head of garlic, and get all the big cloves (don't worry about the annoying, tiny ones in the center).  Smack each of the cloves hard enough to crack the skin (heel of your hand, bottom of a pot, etc.).
Peel them and slice them thinnish.  The garlic pieces need to be small enough to fry into garlic chips, but big enough to not burn instantly, nor drive you insane when you need to retrieve them.  6-8 slices per clove is a good guess.

Set out the paper towels, ready for draining the fried garlic.

Measure out the salt and spice and mix together.

Cook!

Heat the oil in the wok over high heat.  Use a garlic slice as a temperature gauge. When it starts to get crispy, turn the heat back to med-high, pluck it out, and add the sliced garlic.  Stir to get it crispy, but still blond. 

Remove the garlic chips onto the paper towels to drain.

Turn the heat back to high, and place 1/3 - 1/2 of the crab in the oil.  There needs to be plenty or room to stir fry the crab.  After the shell turns red (this happens quickly), sprinkle on 1/3 - 1/2 of the spice-salt.  Keep stirring for about 2 minutes. 

Remove the cooked crab to the serving platter, and repeat until all the crab has been cooked.

Sprinkle the garlic chips back over and serve.

Eat with your hands.  Have a shell bowl and plenty of non-special napkins (paper towels) on hand.

Garlic noodles and a mess of sautéed spinach would go great with this. 

A crisp white wine (Sauvignon Blanc, Dry Riesling, dry Chardonnay)  or a dry Chinese Beer all go great with such a thing as well.

Chowder = Thai Curry... true story

So, this shows up on the boat...

So, they're not all keepers - some too small, some females,
and T's not there, so we can only keep 5.  "Only."

The problem with shell fish is you gotta eat it or freeze it pretty much RIGHT AWAY.  And if it freezes too slowly it tastes funny, and feels funny in your mouth because of the large ice crystals that form during slower freezing.

But - in a soup - it has half a chance.  The soup ingredients change the freezing dynamics, and some other secrets.

But back to my crazy claim - that building a chowder and a Thai Curry are the same process.

Let's start with the ingredients:

Thai Curry:                           Chowder:

coconut fat/oil                          bacon/salt pork/oil
curry paste                               salt & your preferred seasoning
garlic & aromatics                   onions, celery

vegetables                               vegetables
(eggplants, carrots, peppers    (corn, peppers, carrots)
pea pods, cucumbers)
starch - noodles/potatoes         starch - potatoes
creaminess - coconut milk       creaminess - milk/cream
liquid - broth                           liquid - broth
secret ing. - fish sauce             secret ing. - clam juice
protein gently cooked in         protein warmed/cooked in the 
the hot soup (chicken,             hot soup (shellfish or lobster/crab)
prawns or tofu)

In both you heat the fat, and cook up some pungent and aromatic ingredients.  Soften the vegetables, stir in the broth, cook the potatoes, and any other tender vegetables (OK the noodle gig is a bit different - but you get the picture...)
Add the creaminess and season with the secret ingredient.
Heat up or gently cook the protein of your choice.

Which all led me to completely go off the rails while making a corn and crab chowder for dinner - some to eat and some to freeze.  The stunningly delicious result?

Green Curry Corn & Crab Chowder

Ingredients:
1/2 lb Bacon cut into thin strips
1/2 tsp green curry† (a little goes a long way)
1 large yellow onion, chopped (about 2 C)
2 ribs celery, chopped (about 1C)
1/2 C roasted piquillo peppers, chopped*
3/4 C flour (wheat or rice or 1 Tbs corn starch)
2Q (8C) chicken stock (that's 2 of the boxes)
1.5 lbs potatoes (waxy) cut to the size of your end thumb joint
3 ears of corn - cut off the kernels (see below)††
1 C half & half **
1/2 C fresh parsley - or a mix with cilantro - chopped
2 Tbs fish sauce (add more, carefully, to taste)
Per Person - approx. 1/2C - 1C picked dungeness crab meat

Prep:
Chop everything to the right size.  That'll keep you out of trouble for awhile

Cook!
Place a large soup pot over medium heat.  Cook the bacon until most of the fat is cooked out - and it starts to think about getting crispy.  About 10 min.
Add the curry paste and stir it into the rendered bacon fat.  As soon as you can smell it,
add the onions and celery and cook until they start to soften.  About 10 min.
Stir in the flour - cook for about 10 min - until the flour is nice and pasty over the veg.
Add about a cup of the chicken stock - stir to dissolve the flour.  Add in the rest of the the chicken stock and bring to a boil.
Turn the heat down to medium, add in the potatoes, corn and roasted peppers.  Simmer for 10 minutes - check the potatoes.  If the are soft - onto the next step.  If not, keep simmering until the potatoes are fork tender.  When they get there,
Stir in the half & half and herbs.  Stir in the fish sauce and taste.  Add fish sauce a spoonful at a time, tasting as you go.   Stop when it is just right.
Simmer for the last 2 minutes.

Place the crab meat in the bottom of the bowls, and ladle over some soup.

Enjoy while laughing wickedly.

If there is extra soup - let it cool in the fridge, pop it in plastic snap top containers and freeze it ASAP.  Any extra crab goes in there too.

Thaw overnight in the fridge, heat over low heat, and serve with lime wedges to revive the flavors.
  

† Any green curry will do, but if you have a recipe/access to a particularly fresh, lemon grass heavy version - that will give results to brag to your friends about.  You CAN add more, but you don't won't to overwhelm the flavor of the crab.

*Point of substitution to your taste/materials: use regular roasted red peppers, or the amount you want of something spicier or 1C chopped raw red peppers.

† Put a small plate in a large bowl.  Stand the shucked corn cob on the flat end on the plate.  Hold the pointy end.  Use your chefs knife to cut down the cob and cut off the kernels.  No need to go too close the the cob.
Turn the knife so the blunt side is facing the cob, and run it down the side, getting all the yummy, sweet corn juice out.
Use the whole soupy mess in your chowder.

** Another easy substitution - you can go 1C milk and 1C cream if you happen to have that instead.  Or if you don't do dairy, take it a little more over to Thai Curry with 1 can of coconut milk instead.

Galley Edition - 11 Crabs in 3 days

Audacious and Ludicrous Gourmet Crab Enjoyment in Puget Sound

( click on the Crab Dishes to get to the recipes)

They're Monsters!!!!!

6 Crabs on opening day means:

Day 1

Fresh crab, steamed and then cracked in the cockpit with Garlic Bread, and melted butter for dipping.  We had apples and carrots for lunch, and limes in our Mount Gay and tonics, so that counts as salad… Right?

Get out the crackers!
(Caught short?  Break out the pliers.)
The pointy toes mean crabs come with their own picks.

Day 2

Breakfast on the fly (coffee, juice & granola bars) to pick up the pot as we head north to the islands. 

5 more Dungeness!  (it would have been 6, but 1 was a survivor – jumped off the boat!)

Lunch that day – Crab Melts and apples. This was especially appropriate while ‘hove to’ waiting for a favorable tide, at an infamous passage.  The leg meat from the 1^st 6 crabs created an impressive pile of Crab Salad.  Gourmand proportions.

A 2 mile walk (round trip) for provisions landed us a half dozen eggs, buttermilk pancake mix and some veggies. 

Dinner that night – another crab crackin’ good time! 

And the trek to the store meant a Big Green Salad – we were ready for it!  What a way to start the season.

Day 3

Remember those 6 eggs we got last night?  That means breakfast is Crab Omelets.  Too much you say?  But wait, there’s more.

Lunch, after nesting at a mooring with our cruising partners, is Crab Cakes!  More salad on the side.

Dinner – more Big Green Salad, and a pile of Crab Salad made from all the leg meat left.  A loaf of sourdough, and correct beverages make it a lazy summer dinner to write home about.

Day 4

I know I said 3 days, but as long as we eat it all by the end of lunch, it counts as 3.

So for breakfast, a share of the lump meat goes into Crab Crepes.  That packet of buttermilk pancake mix thinned way down made this happen.

And for that last lunch?  Crab Quesadillas.  If you happened to bring tortillas you are all set.  If not, left over crepes might even be better.

What happens next?  Sail around outside your crabbing grounds, and eat some of the food you had actually packed for the cruise.  And then catch some more crab.

Crab by the bucketful!

Dungeness Crab Quesadillas

A brilliant recipe for cruising since it works as a recipe to plan for, or as a way to use up the odds and ends of a bunch of other meals.

Basically, the American Quesadilla has come to mean a tortilla - or other flatbread - folded around cheese - and sometimes other filling - and pan toasted, until the cheese melts.

At the end of my three days of craBonanza I had; body meat, a little crab salad, swiss cheese, and leftover crepes from breakfast.

Lunch turned out to be:

Swiss cheese and a mix of the crab meats placed inside the crepe,
folded in half, and sizzled with the last of the crabby butter left over from the nights we cracked the crabs, in a flat bottomed pan until the cheese melted.
With some apples on the side, it was a wonderful last hurrah to these  lovely crabs.

If I were planning this, and found myself near a farmers market (and this does happen often cruising around North Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands), I would also grab some fresh goat cheese - and some parsley, or basil or thyme.  Hey, if I found the market, I might as well make the most of it!

For each quesadilla:

1 tortilla or other flat bread
1 palm full of crab meat
1 palm full of crumbled or grated cheese (swiss if fresh goat cheese isn't around)
(optional herbs)
A little butter or oil to give the tortilla a nice browning and crispy edges.

Assemble each quesadilla with the cheese crab (and optional herbs) on on half of the tortilla, and place in a heated pan.  peek at the bottom after 2 minutes or so, and watch until it starts to brown.  Flip the quesadilla over, brown the other side, and melt the cheese.

Cut in to pieces (or not) and enjoy as hot as you can.
Apples go very well with this (and Salsa Verde if you are enjoying this on land).

Dungeness Crab Cakes

After a few nights of fresh crab, straight from the shell, I craved something a little more complex.

Since we had a chance to grab a few things from the store - I decided to go for crab cakes.

This was particularly ridiculous since I have never even made them at home.

However, a boat provisioned for sandwiches and salads has everything you need for crab cakes - if you can get your hands on an egg.

These will make very loose crab cakes - more crab, less cake, but they are delicious, and the sort of wonderful, ridiculous thing to do in a surfeit of crab.

Dungeness Crab Cakes... I didn't know until now,
but I've been dreaming of this all year!

Cruising Crab Cakes
(this recipe is proportional.  The recipe works with about 1 heaping Cup of picked crab body meat.  Multiply the proportions for the amount of crab you have.)

Left over bread from previous crab nights, or other bread - toasted until crunchy
                    - or - several plain, Saltine type crackers.
A chunk of onion a little bigger than your thumb, chopped fine
1/3 a red bell pepper, chopped fine
A small handful of parsley -or- half a stalk of celery, chopped fine
(When you are done, all the chopped vegetables should come to less than half the volume of the crab meat)
1 lemon or lime (optional, but very nice)
Salt - to taste
Mayonnaise - amount to be determined
1 egg

Toast the bread until it is crunchy.  Crush it (or the crackers) to crumbs.  You should aim to have approximately as much crumbs as vegetables.
I do the crushing it in the bottom of my broiler pan with another rectangular pan I have on board that fits inside.  Another excellent method is to place the bread in a tea-towel or zip-top bag (with all the air pressed out), and smash it with a sauce pan.  This is an excellent job for idle crew.

Stir together the crab, crumbs, all the vegetables, a sprinkle of salt, and squeeze in the juice from half of your lemon/lime.  Start by adding 1 or 2 tsp of  mayonnaise.  Taste for seasoning - add more salt or lemon as needed.  I do this by hand to get a feel for the mixture.
Then take a handful, and squeeze together.  If it completely falls apart, add a bit more mayo, until it *barely* holds together.

Crack the egg into the mixture, stir that in, and let the mixture sit at least 15 minutes to let the bread crumbs soak up a little more liquid.

Form crab cakes between the palms of your hands, just before you cook them.  They should be the size that your hands make when you gently cup them together, and be no thicker than your hand.  (You really can make them any size you want of course...)

Cooking:

The crab is already cooked, so really you are just frying the egg and the bread to get it all to hold together - and taste more delicious.  This means a quick pan fry - and very gentle flipping.

Heat equal parts butter and oil - enough to *completely cover* the bottom of your skillet/flat bottomed wok in a thin layer.  Don't skimp, or the bread crumbs and egg can't do their jobs.
Making sure each cake has plenty of room around it, place as many cakes as will fit.
Watch one cake, and, as it begins to get brown and crispy on the bottom, flip it, and it's pan buddies over - Very Gently!
Don't be dismayed if a few fall apart.  You will get better at handling these with practice.
These are, after all, much more crab than cake.

Some salad on the side, and a glass of white wine makes this, with the view, an occasion you dream of 11 months and 20 days of the year.

Crab Crepes

     A galley just isn't the sort of place I can keep my usual stocks of baking ingredients.  However, a nice little container of self-rising flour and another of sugar can expand your cooking horizons.
    Or, if you forget - or get a bright idea - a small packet of pancake mix can solve the same problems.  Look for one that has only flour, baking powder/soda and maybe buttermilk.  Avoid anything that has fat (an oil of some sort) and sugar (anything ending in "-ose").  This limits your options.

Crab Crepes
(the leavening will make these puffier than a standard crepe.  If you have plain flour - lucky you!  Use it.)

crepes:
1 C self-rising flour or pancake mix
1 egg
1 Tbs oil
1 C milk
+ about 1 more C milk or water

Mix the egg, oil and first Cup of milk.
Stir this into the Cup of flour.
Stir the extra liquid in, until you have a thin batter that will spread around the pan just by rotating the pan.  If you can, let the batter sit for about an hour - this is a help, but not essential.

Heat a tsp of butter or oil in a skillet or flat bottomed wok.  Test with a drop of batter - when it sizzles the pan is ready.  Pour in just enough batter to barely cover the bottom of the pan (or make the crepe size you want).  as the batter starts to firm up, shake the pan to loosen the crepe.  As soon as the crepe has a little color on the bottom, and is sturdy enough, flip the crepe with a spatula.
Let the crepe get a little brown on the bottom, and stack on a plate.
Make all the crepes you need for breakfast.
After breakfast, use up the rest of the batter to make crepes for quesadillas later.

fillings:

Crab & Cheese - A small handful of body meat, and some swiss cheese.  Roll into a finished crepe, heat gently to warm the meat and melt the cheese.

Crab & Tart Stone Fruit - Crab season and stone fruit season start together.  If you happen to hit a farmers market just before, or during your cruise, pick up a nectarine, pluot, plum or even a peach.  If there is some fresh goat cheese, grab that as well.
Cut up the fruit into bite size chunks, and stir about a tsp of sugar in with it.  Let that sit and get juicy (macerate) while you are making the crepes.
Fill your crepes with a small handful of body meat, a large spoonful of the fruit, (and if you got your hands on it, a bit of the goat cheese) roll up the crepe, and heat gently to warm the ingredients.

If crab for breakfast is too much for any of the crew, a little butter and sugar is nice too - or just some of the fruit.

Note:
If your batter is too thick, it is easy to thin.  If you added too much liquid, stir in a little more flour/pancake mix.  Crepe batter is quite thin and runny, so try a small crepe before you despair.

Crab Omelets

It is breakfast time, and you have a pile of crab in your little refrigerator from all those crustaceans you just couldn't eat.  What to do, what to do?

For two people - expand as necessary.

Crab Omelets


1 handful of body meat (leg meat would work too)
1 handful of shredded swiss cheese or 2 slices

3 eggs, beaten
salt and pepper

leftover, crabby butter from the crab cracking -or-
a little oil

a skillet or flat bottomed wok

Beat the eggs, add a pinch of salt & barely any pepper.
Heat a tsp. or so of butter or oil in the pan.  Test with a drop of egg to make sure it sizzles.
Pour 1/2 the egg mixture into the pan.  Roll the pan around to make sure the bottom gets covered.
As the egg starts to solidify, shake the pan to loosen the omelet.
When the egg is no longer liquid - but still soft - lay down the cheese along the center, then half the crab.
Roll or fold the omelet.
Let it sit in the pan just another moment.
Slide onto a plate - get someone to eat it hot.

Repeat the whole thing, and eat this one hot all by yourself!

Crab Melts

A great quick lunch (or dinner) when you want something hot, and are loaded up with crabby goodness.

Crab Melts


Left over bread from cracked crab night -or-
Toasted English muffins (sourdough is my favorite)
(I like to toast them at about 350F for 10 min or so to make the top crispy - this is optional, but keeps the bread from getting soggy.)

Enough Crab Salad to cover the bread
1 slice swiss cheese

Spread a nice thick layer of the crab salad over the toast, pop the cheese on top, and warm in the oven (350F) until the cheese melts.

Serve with some fruit or veg.
Yum!

Dungeness Crab Salad

The best part about crab salad is once you have made it, it can go in the refrigerator/cooler and then you have the base for a few quick meals while under way, or after a long day.

And you can make as little or as much as you want based on the number of crab legs/claws you have left over from the crab cracking the night before.

Since this is the galley edition, the amounts are all going be very approximate, and proportional, since you will always have the amount of crab meat you have.

And since this is my blog, I urge you, as always, to go with your own taste as the final judge.

Ingredients:

Picked leg and claw meat (can use body meat, but that's so good for crab cakes & crepes &...)
Celery and/or Parsley
Red Pepper or Paprika
Onion (purple or sweet or green or...) or Garlic
Mayonnaise
Salt
Lemon or Lime juice

For each heaping cup/large handful of crab meat:
dice or chop fine about 1/4 that amount of Celery and Red pepper (if using paprika, sprinkle in to your taste at the end).
dice a piece of onion slightly bigger than your thumb, or crush and mince a clove of garlic

Toss all these together, and add about a tablespoon of mayonnaise, a pinch of salt and the juice from half a lemon.
Stir together and taste.
Adjust the amounts of ingredients to your taste.

What can you do with this?

Serve it over some of your Big Green Salad - with some warm bread on the side.

Put some on an English muffin (a toasted sourdough one is my favorite), and melt some swiss cheese over it. - Crab Melt!  Beats the flippers off any tuna or patty melt out there.

And if you do bring crab home, and make it there... and there's just too much to eat - it FREEZES!  It is not quite as amazing as fresh.... but what is?
However, you can keep it in the freezer for a few weeks, thaw it in the fridge, and enjoy it your favorite way when you want to impress friends, or just because you deserve more crab.

Steamed Dungeness Crab

So you've made the leap - bought a crab trap and a can of tuna, and dropped it near some other crab pot floats.

You go back, pull it up, and you have crabs - and they are keepers.  This is exciting!

Now what?

The bad news is you need to get these guys cooked pretty soon*.

The good news is cooking is as easy as boiling water, and after they are cooked, separating the tasty stuff from the yeuccchhhh is possibly even easier.

My Favorite Method**:

For the beginner - just leave the crabs whole and live.  Rinse them well with sea water (fresh water is OK too).  For the advanced crabber, get out your gloves, and clean and split the crabs first.

Get a hold of a pot with a Lid (essential) big enough to hold at least 1 crab, with some room to spare.
A "big, ol' crab cookin' pot" is great, but sometimes you just need to work with what you've got.
Line the bottom with smooth, flat rocks, the type that is easy to hold in your hand - the kind you'd think of as "skippin' stones."
[The rocks help hold heat.  With the little dinky galley burners, it takes a long time to bring the water back to a boil, so getting the rocks helps speed the cooking.  Wash them off and use them over and over. ]

Do you have to have rocks?  Nope - but they are handy.

Fill the pot with about 1inch of water - just over the top of the stones.

Bring the water to a steamy boil.
Put the crab in and clap on the lid.

Let the crab steam for 8-11 minutes.

Remove with tongs and let it cool enough to clean.

Cooling in the cockpit

Repeat with the rest of your crabs.  As you get a feel for your stove and the crabs, you can steam 2 or more crabs at a time.

When your crab has cooled - pop the top.

Get your crab to where you are going to rinse your crabs.  This is about to get messy.
You will need running water. The shower on your swim step, a hose, or a friend with a bucket of water to pour slowly over the crab while you are cleaning, are all good options.

Hold onto the shell the one hand, and the legs on one side with another.  Pull up on the shell.
All the soft stuff goes - and you can just rinse it over the side.  It belongs to the sea, so return it there.
Pull off the little "dead man's fingers" the floppy, pointy gills attached to the hard body under the shell.

Now your crab is clean.

Crack it open, extract the meat and munch!

can't talk, eating

- and to complete the perfect meal?
Melted butter (or even clarified/drawn butter or ghee - all the same thing)
Garlic Bread
a Big Green Salad

* Cook your crabs soon.  They can live out of the water for a bit - but they can get too hot or suffocate if it is too long.  Some options are:
Cooling the crab by putting it in your refrigerator in a paper bag.
Making a mini "live well"; If you have 1 or 2 crabs, they can go in your big crab cooking pot, just  change the water every 45 minutes or so.
If you have more crabs, a cooler works great - and change the water every hour.  The more crabs you have, the more important it is the water is changed thoroughly.  The crabs use up the oxygen from the water, and put waste products into it.  If you do not change the water, they can poison themselves if you have to hold them for too long in the same water.
The water changing method also means you can hold your crabs for quite awhile.  We've done it for 6 - 8 hours with no ill affects.  Just don't lose your bucket!

If you are unsure of the health of you crabs, poke them a little.  If they still act annoyed, you are in good shape.

**There are many other methods for cooking crabs, and all of them work pretty much the same - this is just nice for a small galley with a bitty little flame.

It is also a method that works if all you have is a big sauce pan, or a flat bottomed wok - with a lid.

However you cook the crabs, you must have a lid.

     You can also boil a pot of water and cook the crabs that way.  However - the crabs remove a huge amount of heat from the water when you put them in.  Then it takes the water ages to get back to the boil.  Fortunately it is not necessary for the water to be actually boiling to cook the crabs.
     Water boils at 212˚F, and the crabs cook at a much lower temperature.  Up to 3 crabs covered in water that started at boiling will still cook in about 8 - 12 minutes, as long as you keep the lid on, and the pot over the burner to keep adding heat.

You do need the rocks or something else to keep the crabs out of the water, to do the steaming method.
If the crab is half in the boiling water, the water will not come back to steaming temperature for quite awhile, and the part of the crab in the water will cook a different amount than the part out of the water.

Necatarines, Sweet Onions, Corn and CRAB!

Local Produce wise, it is the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. Seriously - take your pick! The salmon and crab are in full flower, the stone fruit is rolling in, berries are burying us, and corn, peppers and onions and herbs are coming up like weeds.

The New England Clam Bake makes so much sense, but out here, crab and salmon and mussels take center stage.

Anyway - a wonderful meal made: Crab Salad with a Fresh summer Relish... and of course Corn on the Cob!

*Nectarine and Sweet Onion Relish*

(please remember - all these amounts are "-ish" and to your taste!)

A firm Nectarine (a good place to use the one that is not quite ripe) cut into small chunks.

A small sweet onion, or 1/2 of a larger one, again, cut into small chunks

a 1/2 cup of sweetish white wine (sparkling if you have it)

1 tsp fresh oregano, chopped

about the same of basil, Thai Basil is really nice here... but any will do (as would none...)

Salt and Pepper to taste

Let this sit for a few hours, overnight if you are thinking ahead.

*Catch some Crab and Cook it Your Favorite Way*

I steam mine live and whole for about 10 minutes and let them cool.

*Cook the Corn*

While the crab is cooling, boil a big pot of water, place the corn in the water, and boil for about 3 minutes. Pull the corn out and cool. Serve with butter, salt & pepper.

.... when the crab has cooled, quickly

pop the shell off, and clean them. With dungeness crabs, cut off the shell around the legs and body meat. All you need is a strong set of kitchen shears to cut and crack, and the crab toes make great picks.

Or if catching/cooking is not an option, get a bunch of the freshest crab meat you can.

Chop up some sort of crunchy leafy veg... Purple cabbage, butter lettuce, what ever comes to hand.

Dress it with a nice light vinaigrette (oil, vinegar, a little garlic, salt, pepper, mustard as emulsifier).

Dressed chopped salad on the bottom

Crab meat goes on top.

A big spoon of the nectarine relish goes on top.

A cob of corn

Napkins!

The rest of the wine you were cooking with!

Enjoy!