Crab. Just mention the word and a spontaneous association of
other images come to mind. I think of the red-orange shell color
when cooked. I fear their claws when they are living. I imagine the
delicate texture of their meat.
Crab. Just mention the word and a spontaneous association of other images come to mind. I think of the red-orange shell color when cooked. I fear their claws when they are living. I imagine the delicate texture of their meat. I hate to say it, but the word also reminds me of a few people I know! Since crab is a theme this week for South Valley Newspapers, I have been assigned the task of grilled crab.
Serving crab at holiday gatherings has been gaining popularity. For my family, it is hardly a new thing. On my Mother’s side of the family, the large celebration took place on Christmas Eve. The Old Italian Catholic tradition restricted the consumption of meat on Christmas Eve. The large evening meal consisted of cioppino. If you are not familiar with cioppino, it is a seafood stew that contains clams, shrimp, scallops and crab, which has been cooked in a flavorful tomato sauce.
In later years, the obligation of a meatless Christmas Eve ended. Crab increased in price and became very expensive to prepare for a large group of people. The tradition ended and sausage replaced the cioppino.
When you purchase crab at the grocery store, it has already been steamed or boiled to cook the meat. This is done for ease of the consumer and ease of storage. Unless you visit a store that specialized in selling fresh caught seafood or know someone who goes crabbing, live crab is difficult to find. Even if you were able to obtain live crab, it would not be good if cooked directly on the grill. In order to give the meat in the crab shell flavor, there has to be a way to allow salt to penetrate the shell. The best method to accomplish this is to submerge the crab in salted boiling water.
I never made the attempt to grill crab before the theme was suggested for this week. I realized that I needed to do some research and experimenting. My research didn’t lead to much information about grilled crab. Most of the information was vague and did not give methods or times. I had to experiment. I used a pre-cooked crab and allowed it to heat over the flames. I turned it every few minutes to allow the heat to penetrate both sides of the crab shell. I was very disappointed with the results. The crab leaked the juices and the meat lost its texture and became dry. The shell also dried out. When the shell was cracked to retrieve the meat, it was brittle and fractured into small pieces.
In order to preserve the texture and integrity of the shell, another method was needed to grill crab. Steam is required so that the meat does not dry and so the shell does not break.
I determined that a grill pack would be the best method to warm the crab on the grill. One sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil may be too weak for the sharp ends of the legs. If you use a double layer heavy-duty aluminum foil and a hole is accidentally punctured in the first layer, another layer is present to prevent leaking of the liquid.
A disposable aluminum baking pan may be used too.
I didn’t want to use water as the liquid medium. Instead, I wanted it to have some flavor that would compliment the crab. For this, I used melted butter, one of my favorite white wines, some fine minced shallot and some salt and pepper.
Once done, this becomes a very tasty dipping sauce for the crab.
It was easier to construct the grill pack when the crab was cleaned. For this method, you need to separate the legs and edible part of the body from the outer body shell and inedible part of the body.
Place the cleaned crab in the middle of the aluminum foil, fold opposite ends of the foil together and crimp along their edge.
Now that you have two opposite ends open, close and crimp one end, pour the sauce into the pack and close the remaining end.
Although grilled crab seemed like a challenge at first, the results were absolutely delicious.
The combination of butter and wine with shallot does not overpower the true flavor of the crab, but serves to complement it. If you plan on serving crab for one of your holiday gatherings, consider this method for grilled crab. It is a unique and simple way to prepare what is quickly becoming a holiday favorite.
Mitch L. Mariani II is a self-taught amateur chef. Questions, comments and suggestions can be directed to him through
email at [email protected]. For tips and recipes, visit www.geocities.com/MixedGrill
SouthValley.
