Last night I finally cooked up something that I have been craving for...Real Crabcakes...and 
what do I mean by real?  I mean crab cakes made with non-pasturized canned crabmeat from
Indonesia, or China, or somewhere other than a domestic Blue Claw Crab.  I guess the crab
cake I was looking for was a Maryland Style Crab Cake...around the world, crabcakes are made
with the local crab.  In fact this past week I had the pleasure of cooking for a group of clients/
friends in Seattle and we used their local Dungeness Crabs in a pasta dish...THAT will be another
blog post for this coming week..stay tuned for that...So after coming back home from the West 
Coast and having crab on my mind I went out yesterday to look for some already picked over 
Blue Claw meat.  I was told not in stock, a summertime product for sale because of the higher
demand, and come back right before Christmas when every fishmonger in this area is over-
stocked with fish and seafood because of the high Italian-American population.  We generally
will only eat seafood on Christmas Eve and this tradition has spilled over into non-Italians as
well. But yesterday I needed the crab meat...the Crab Shack of Mantoloking had bushels and
bushels of various sized crabs...i opted for a large size crab @ 18.00 per dozen and purchased
a dozen and a half.  The kids (crab is their favorite food) couldn't have been happier!~
For this recipe I decided to not do a separate vegetable dish for dinner..I added some fresh
chopped spinach to the mix, along with a small handful of bacon I sauteed with onion.  The 
flavors were excellent.  If you are not looking to add these items to your crabcake, then simply
omit the (what a mistake that will be, but...you're on your own here...)


Above you see the progression of live crab to steaming to cleaning to having all the body meat picked
out of them.  The end result is to have 2 cups of clean fresh white crab meat.  Body meat, as in back
fin and lump crabmeat.  The claw and leg meat, while delicious is not used in my crabcake..I saved
all the claws to make a crab sauce with linguine this week...There is so much flavor in the crab that
just using claws and legs will make a very nice sauce to dress your pasta.  Ok..another blogpost
perhaps, but for now, back to crabcaking.  Once you have your 2 cups of meat, squeeze the juice of
one lemon over and toss.  Place back into the fridge, it's very perishable.  Dice 4 strips of bacon
and 1 medium onion and saute together until the bacon is crisp and the onions are soft..add a little
touch of oil to the pan.  Then add 1 cup of chopped cooked spinach to the pan and let it all cook for
about 2 minutes.  Remove from the heat.

Remove the crab meat from the fridge and  add to the bowl 1 beaten egg, 1 1/2 tsp. dijon mustard,
1 dash of Tabasco Sauce, 2 tbs. chopped parsley, 2 tbs. Hellman's Mayonaise, 3 tbs. Panko bread-
crumbs, 1 tsp. any good Old Bay style seasoning...I use BlueCrab Co's Chesapeake Bay Seasoning
http://www.bluecrabbay.com/Shore-Seasonings/products/1008/    It's the secret to my fried chicken too!
, pinch of salt, and black pepper, mix well..then add the spinach,bacon, and onion mixture.  Blend
well and let this sit for 1/2 hour in the fridge.  Then form into 10 cakes.



Once you've formed the happy little crabby patties, coat them with more panko that you've mixed
with another tsp. of the Bay Seasoning.  No need to flour and egg them for breading.  In a wide
frying pan, add 3 tbs. of olive oil and 2 tsp. of butter...let it get medium-hot and fry the cakes for
about 4 minutes per side.  Of course, times are always different with your stove top, so using your
spatula, gently lift a cake to make sure it's browning properly, not burning.  Remove them to paper
towels to drain and keep warm in a low oven on an ovenproof plate until you have cooked all 10
cakes.


Serve these heavenly treats of the sea with chopped parsley and lemon wedges as a garnish
and the sauce of your choice..mine?  Well that would be a spicy and oniony tartar, remoulade,
or Russian...I love the tastes of heat, mustard, with the sweet of the onion and gherkins...
The interior of the cake should be creamy...not dry, not bready....



Great idea for a party food too...just make them into smaller bite sized cakes and
adjust your cooking times.  Time to head back into the kitchen, it's dinner time
on Sunday and Meatloaf with dill, tomato, mustard, and onion is on the menu...


But, here's a look at last night's tasty feast with the family....