Crab Chaos – Crabcakes with Chipotle Aioli

I must have been about 7 years old when my father brought home a big bag of blue crabs from the Italian Market. A trip to the open-air fruit and vegetable stands, cheese and spice stores, fish mongers, butchers, and live animal stalls lining 9^th Street in South Philadelphia was not a rarity, but bringing home live crabs was definitely not the norm.

When he got home late that Saturday morning, he unloaded the car packed with bags of fruits and vegetables, fish and meats, cheese and spices; enough to stock the kitchen and feed three hungry boys for a couple of weeks.

Then he brought the live crabs from the car. The paper bag in which they had been gingerly placed for transport was soaked and its integrity severely compromised. The bag ripped and crabs tumbled onto our porch. Chaos ensued as a dozen – probably more – scurried everywhere, looking for cover.

If you don’t know much about blue crabs, they are not docile creatures. As part of my master’s thesis research in Marine Environmental Sciences, I spent hours underwater counting mortality of juvenile scallops we had placed in well-defined plots in eelgrass beds on the bay bottom of a beautiful estuary on the North Fork of Long Island. One day as I started counting in full SCUBA gear, I found a blue crab in the center of my quadrat. It wanted to stay among the grass blades, and I wanted to count. That crab was mean and nasty and wouldn’t leave. We ended up battling it out, me with a simple pencil and the crab with its claws. I had to dodge and dart to prevent wounds as the crustacean defended its territory. It was without a doubt more graceful underwater than I, but finally, I prevailed, chasing it off to another patch of eelgrass so I could proceed with my data collection. Luckily, I escaped injury, although I did gain an appreciation for their scientific name, Callinectes sapidus, meaning “beautiful swimmer” in Latin.

On land they are only slightly less agile than underwater, but just as feisty, especially if they have been crammed in a bag with their peers and spilled onto a porch floor. And unlike lobsters, crabs’ claws are not bound by rubber bands when purchased, presenting a unique hazard. We closed the porch doors to keep them contained and set about capturing the beasts barehanded. It wasn’t easy. As we approached a crab, it scampered in reverse, claws agape, ready to pinch and defend. It was a thrilling adventure for my seven-year-old self. Eventually we collected them all and lived to tell the tale, and I assume my parents ate them for dinner. I don’t remember my father ever bringing home crabs again.

Scarred by the great escape I was never much interested in buying live crabs. While I make crabcakes from time to time, a big bag of dangerous, live crustaceans is not part of my plan. But throughout my student days as a poor marine biologist in training, we had to eat somehow. During a semester in Oregon we harvested and shelled so many Dungeness crabs that we had the biggest bowl of fresh crab meat ever, along with a summons from the Fish and Wildlife Division of the Oregon State Police for undersize crabs. One summer when I was working on Cape Cod bleeding horseshoe crabs in a lab some friends and I went crabbing for blue crabs. We used the old chicken neck on a string technique. Unfortunately, the one crab we caught for four people did not a meal – or even a single crabcake – make.

While I haven’t been to the Italian Market in some years, when I visit Chinatown in Flushing, Queens there are baskets of live blue crabs squirming in the markets and sometimes individuals selling them to willing buyers out on the street. Whenever I see crabs attempting to escape and the purveyors wrangling them back into their basket, I am fondly reminded of the chaos on our porch long ago. And these vendors clearly know more than we did…they use long tongs to pick up the blue crabs and then place them in plastic bags, which are far more secure than the paper bag that disintegrated causing bedlam on our porch when I was young.

Crabcakes with Chipotle Aioli

While I haven’t purchased live crabs since the adventure of my youth, I do enjoy a good crabcake. That means either ordering it in a restaurant or buying cans of lump crab meat and making them myself. Unfortunately, ordering them is not always a winning proposition. There is often too much filler (i.e., breadcrumbs) diluting the crab, the result being that they’re more about fry than actual crab. So, I learned to cook them in my kitchen.

Preparing them is a relatively easy proposition. Sauteing some aromatics, mixing the meat right from the can with some spices, and adding a few ingredients to bind them is about all it takes. They are then gingerly shaped and dredged in a light coating of breadcrumbs, followed by a rest in the refrigerator before pan frying to a golden crispness. The result is light and flavorful.

As for spices to use, there are numerous variations, many tied to specific regional preferences – think Old Bay seasoning in Maryland, for example, or Cajun and Creole spices in Louisiana. I keep mine simple, leaving out garlic, which I think overwhelms the sweet crab, but adding finely minced tarragon, which complements the meat perfectly. No matter how you spice up your crabcakes, they will be a delightful, welcome treat.

makes four 3-inch diameter crabcakes, a half hour, plus two hours resting time

For the crabcakes:

2 Tbsp. butter, divided

3 scallions, finely chopped, about ¼ cup

½ of a red bell pepper, minced, about ¼ cup

½ tsp. kosher salt, divided, plus more for serving

½ tsp. fresh ground black pepper, divided

a pinch of cayenne pepper

½ Tbsp. minced fresh tarragon

1 Tbsp. minced fresh parsley

3 Tbsp. plus ¼ to ½ cup panko breadcrumbs, divided

6 – 8 oz. lump or jumbo lump crab meat, picked over for pieces of shell and cartilage

2 Tbsp. mayonnaise

½ lightly beaten egg

¼ cup olive oil

For the chipotle aioli:

1 chipotle pepper in adobo sauce (from a can), minced, plus 1 Tbsp. (or more) adobo sauce (store the remainder in a glass jar in the refrigerator for another use)

¼ cup mayonnaise

1. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the scallions and bell peppers and sauté until almost soft, about 5 or 6 minutes. Stir in ¼ teaspoon salt, ¼ teaspoon pepper, and pinch of cayenne and cook for another minute or two. Place in a large bowl and allow to cool.
2. Add tarragon, parsley, 3 tablespoons panko, crab meat, mayonnaise, egg, and remaining ¼ teaspoon of salt and pepper to the bowl. Mix gently but thoroughly until combined.
3. Place remaining ¼ to ½ cup panko on a plate and line another plate with a piece of parchment paper.
4. Using your hands, form mixture into four ½-inch thick, 3-inch diameter cakes. Gently dredge each crabcake in panko pressing lightly so it sticks on all sides. Place on parchment and put the plate in the refrigerator to rest for about two hours.
5. Prepare the chipotle aioli by mincing 1 chipotle pepper and adding it to the mayonnaise, along with 1 tablespoon or more of adobo from the can. Combine well and reserve in the refrigerator.
6. When ready to cook, heat olive oil and remaining 1 tablespoon of butter over a medium-high heat in a heavy skillet large enough to comfortably hold and flip all four crabcakes. Test the oil with a speck of breadcrumb. When it sizzles immediately after being placed in, carefully add the crabcakes. Allow them to cook until the bottom is golden brown, about 4 or 5 minutes. Adjust the heat as necessary so the bottom does not burn before the inside gets heated through. Flip crabcakes and cook on other side until golden brown, an additional 3 or 4 minutes. Immediately sprinkle with salt to taste.
7. Serve hot with chipotle aioli or other dipping sauce of your choice on the side.

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