If you've caught live crab using crab pots, your next step is to cook them so that you can eat them. Whether you've caught them yourself or purchased them live, you should cook them quickly. Put the crab in the freezer for an hour which will send it to sleep. Copyright Howtodothings.com © 2016, all rights reserved. But just as chefs have found alternate ways of quickly killing and cooking lobsters to get the sweetest-tasting meat, I prefer to deliver a quick, fatal blow with a rolling pin to the breastplate on the underside of the crab. Bringing our catch back to the kitchen and preparing for our feast is the best part. The dark brown crabs that are brought to market usually weigh 1 to 2 pounds and up and measure at least 6 1/4 inches across. Three whole Dungeness crabs yield about 1 1/2 pounds crabmeat. Copyright Howtodothings.com © 2016, all rights reserved. Live crabs are rambunctious, but preparing them isn’t as hard as it seems. Before you start boiling the water, …

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has placed this preservative on its priority list of additives to study, and Australia has already outlawed it. Add … Powered by the Parse.ly Publisher Platform (P3). I find that cleaning the crab before you cook it results in the sweetest meat. When the water is boiling, drop your crabs into the pot. Most specialty markets and grocery stores sell untreated crab, which is what you want. If you’ve ever cooked a live crab and tasted the sweet meat, you’ll know that steaming crabs yourself makes a big difference in the flavor. Keep live crabs loosely covered in the refrigerator up to 12 hours. Here's how to cook live crab: Crab is delicious and healthy, and it is surprisingly easy to cook live crab. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast. Then I prepare, steam, and shell the crab as follows. Put the crabs in a steamer basket or insert or simply pile them into the pot and let the bottom crabs … You don't need any special equipment to enjoy this treat. Lump crabmeat refers to whole pieces of white meat from the body of the crab, while flake refers to white and dark meat from the body and claws of the crab. How To Do Things. You can rate this recipe by giving it a score of one, two, three, or four forks, which will be averaged out with other cooks' ratings. To cook live crab, all you need is a large pot of boiling water with a little salt.
Place the steamer section into the pot, making sure the steamer is not touching the liquid.

Hold the broken edge of both halves under running water or salt water to rinse the guts and pith away. I realize I am very lucky—not everyone has the Pacific Ocean as their backyard. If you don’t have access to live crabs, look for high-quality cooked lump crabmeat from Dungeness, blue, peekytoe, or snow crabs. We never know just how many crabs will take the bait, and it’s a family tradition to guess how many will be in each pot. Dungeness crabs have been part of the Northwest’s seafood heritage for the millennium.

Place the crabmeat in a bowl and pick through it by hand to ensure no shell is left in the meat. Try to keep the pieces as intact as possible. Cover the pot, put it on the stove or over a hot campfire, and bring the water to a rolling boil.

(This is our preferred method) Here's my tried-and-true method for cooking blue crab: Put an couple inches of water into a big, sturdy pot. When you steam instead of boil the meat, the crab is white, tender, and succulent, without any fishy aroma or slimy texture. Then grip the crab firmly and open your arms to pull the halves apart, leaving the main outer shell intact. Cook the crab by heating about 1 cup water in a large pot with a vegetable or pasta steamer insert. You just have to go with what you have. Over high heat, bring the water to a boil. The local crab season is summer, and that’s when my boys and I go crabbing almost every day, filling the round metal crab pots with raw chicken and dropping them in the cold water, returning the next day to see what we’ve caught.

Over high heat, bring the water to a boil. Canned crab usually has added preservatives, so check the label carefully. Boil the water. Reserve the crab shells for crab stock. Bring the water, vinegar (or beer), and salt to a boil in your large pot and add in 2 tbsp of the Old Bay seasoning. It’s important to keep them cool and moist until cooking by keeping the wrapped crabs in the refrigerator or covering them with wet newspaper. Use of and/or registration on any portion of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement (updated 1/1/20) and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement (updated 1/1/20). If you wanted to make crab cakes but find that you don’t have enough meat, make something else: crab cocktail, crab soup, or Dungeness crab mac and cheese. Carefully take your live crabs out of the ice water with tongs and place them into the steamer pot one by one. First, you can bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil, drop in the crab, cover the pot, and cook for 20 minutes. Fill your large pot with water, and bring it to a boil. Dungeness crab is a true Pacific Coast food: It’s found only in the Pacific Ocean, and it gets its name from the town of Dungeness, Washington. Obtain a live crab . Cook the crab by heating about 1 cup water in a large pot with a vegetable or pasta steamer insert. You have a couple of options. Grasp crabs carefully from the … When using precooked crabmeat, taste it first to make sure it is not excessively salty. Much of the cooked crabmeat sold in stores is now treated with calcium disodium EDTA, a preservative that helps retard crystal formation. Remove the steamed crab from the pot and set them aside to cool. The crabmeat will keep, covered, in the refrigerator, for up to 3 days after you cook it. The crab is now ready to cook. Because we never know how much crab we’ll get, we plan the meal after the catch. Holding onto the crab, push your thumbs forward and pull the legs of the crab together, bending the crab in half. If you like, you can also share your specific comments, positive or negative - as well as any tips or substitutions - in the written review space. If you adapt your dishes to the ingredients, cooking becomes a lot more relaxing and a lot more fun. Reach among the legs to place your hands on either side of the body with your thumbs on the breastplate. After they have died, the crab meat will deteriorate very quickly, and may present a health risk if the crab is not cooked immediately. If it is, rinse the meat to get rid of some of the salt. Once the crab has cooled, pick out the meat from the body, legs, and claws. Dungeness crab need to be cooked while they're still alive, so the … Add the crab halves and steam them for about 10 to 15 minutes, depending on how many you’re cooking, until the meat is opaque and the shells turn dark orange. Because this is a messy process, it’s best to prepare the crabs over the sink if you can’t clean them right on the beach or off the side of a boat.

If you’re using live crab, don’t be shy in asking the fishmonger for crabs with all the legs and claws intact; that’s where the meat is.

The crab should be in large pieces, not shredded, and should be refrigerated. By law, only the male crabs can be caught, and thanks to careful fishery management and high reproductive rates, Dungeness are among the most sustainable shellfish in the world. Be the first to rate and review this recipe. Cooking a crab humanely Put the crab straight into boiling water which will kill it within 10 seconds. In most cases, live crab should be boiled.