Blue crabs have made an appearance at our fish market. One of my favorite ways of eating blue crab is the preparation they do at Hop Kee in Chinatown. Bionic Bites did a great blog post about the Cantonese restaurant and she is right their saucy crabs are fantastic. While I wanted to make Cantonese-style crabs, I thought I might try to recreate the ginger scallion crabs we had in San Francisco. There, we had dungeness crab, but I thought it would be good with blue crab as well, and thankfully I was right. This dish is finger-licking good!

If you are a crab lover, I recommend this dish, but my guy does not really “get” crab. Something about the way they look and all the effort you have to put into eating the crustacean. I could not disagree more, but this dish really is for those that love crab because there is no elegant way to eat this dish. The savory sauce plays off the fantastically sweet crab flesh so well but it is messy. Messy good, but I felt obligated to warn you!

Cleaning the live crabs requires a bit of bravery. I actually chickened out and had the fish guy do it for me. There are a lot of YouTube videos about cleaning crabs as well and next time I feel like I will be brave enough. It’s recommended that you kill the crab yourself because they spoil very quickly but I live so close to the fish store I did not feel it was a food safety issue. Next time I will be more brave I promise!

Chinese-Style Blue Crabs with Scallion and Ginger Sauce

Ingredients

• 6 live blue crabs, cleaned to your liking and halved (I discarded the tops)
• ½(or more) cup corn or potato starch, enough to coat the crabs generously
• Sea salt to season the crabs after they have been dredged
• 1 cup oil
• 5 scallions, tops and bottoms removed and sliced in half then cut up in fours
• 2 -1 inch pieces of ginger, julienned
• 5 small cloves of garlic, minced
• About two tablespoons of sherry, rice wine or dry vermouth( a few glugs)
• About two tablespoons of soy sauce (I used braggs as I am gluten free{a few generous splashes})

Preparation:

I did not clean the crabs that much, but you can if you are squeamish, I halved them and gently crushed the claws so that they would be easier to eat.


I dredged them heavily in potato flour and salted them with sea salt

In a very very hot wok I fried them. Making sure I did not crowd them. Flipping them over twice. I am reticent to give times on this because everyone’s stove is different. You want to make sure they are cooked through. After they were done, I let them rest while I cut up the ginger, and garlic and scallions. I emptied the wok of the oil and added a few tablespoons back. Then I added the scallions, ginger and garlic. When they became fragrant I added the rice wine and soy sauce. Then I added the crabs back into the wok and tossed them until they were completely incorporated into the sauce. The potato starch will thicken the sauce. Enjoy!
I plated them and served them with soft jasmine rice and garnished them with cilantro. This serves two to four people depending on how many dishes you make to accompany this dish. Enjoy!

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October 25, 2010 | Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL. Posted in: Chinese, Garlic, Ginger, Seafood