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Simple Crab Cake Recipe

This is a version of another crab cake recipe that has all the basics, but not all the bells and whistles. Just to give some credit, here is a link to two other recipes that we used to make our own. Now these recipes have all the bells and whistles, so be forewarned! These were a basis, as well as another home made version.

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/easy-crab-cakes

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/crab-cakes-recipe.html

Crab Cake Recipe Ingredients

Draining the Crab Meat

checking for more shells in Crab meat

Our ingredients:

We had 3 cups of crab meat to mix and these amounts were great. We made about 11 really decent sized crab cakes.

1/3 cup regular bread crumbs (you will be using more bread crumbs for the outside)
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard (or spicy brown mustard)
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 eggs
1 or 2 drops hot sauce (we use Louisiana hot sauce, but there are many)

You will need more regular bread crumbs and Panko style bread crumbs (for texture) for the outside of the crab cakes.

1 – Drain the juice from the meat. Similar to what you would do to a can of tuna, if you were going to make tuna salad sandwich, you wouldn’t want it to be runny. At the same time, you can be checking for shells. We harvested our own crabs, and cleaned them for the crab meat, so we have to be extra cautious.

Mixing up the Crab Cake Mix

Put Crab Cake Mix in fridge

Forming the Crab Cakes

2 – Double check for shells. Just before you start the mix it is a real good idea. Even after we checked, double and triple checked, we still had a few shells in ours, so take your time!

3 – Start by adding the mayo, lemon juice, garlic powder, mustard, pepper, worcestershire sauce, and the 2 eggs. Mix it up a little bit, then add the bread crumbs and mix up good. Now add the 1 or 2 or none drops of hot sauce and mix again.

4 – Put this mix in the fridge for 30 minutes or more.

5 – Now take a cake pan or something with a little depth in it and add equal amounts of regular and Panko style bread crumbs. We used a full cup of each in our case. With a ice cream scooper, spoon, measuring cup, or your hand, get a lump of the mix and form into the “cake” that you want. I don’t think it has to look like a hamburger patty, but thicker is usually better as it holds together better. Thinner would break too easily. You may want to separate all the meat before you bread so you can see how many crab cakes you end up with. You may need to reduce the size a little to add a few crab cakes. I want to try making “crab balls” like hush puppies, but with crab meat inside instead of just salty paste like bread. I would cook crab balls in a deep fryer.

Frying crab cake in frying pan

6 – once you have used up all your crab meat, it is time to cook them up. If you are going to fry them in a pan, or in a deep fryer, it still takes 3 – 5 minutes to cook them. If you chose the “ball” style then a deep fryer is a must. If you cook them slow, they will cook all the way through without burning the outside. Trying to cook them fast will not do good, because you won’t cook the inside.

Frying pan – Put some regular cooking oil in the pan and cover the bottom. Now it is just like cooking a hamburger patty, put it in and let it start cooking. After a minute or two, check the bottom and if it looks good and brown, go ahead and flip it. Once you get both sides cooked, it will be a little easier to turn over. Slow is better than fast.

Frying crab cakes in deep fryer

Deep fryer – Don’t stack them on top of each other, lay them side by side. Cook as many as your tray will allow at one time. We set our fryer on 160 degrees and that was good.

7 – Now just start piling them on to a tray (preferably with a paper towel) as they finish to let them drain. Pretty soon they will all have been cooked and it will be time to enjoy!

Once you have made these a time or two, then you can adjust the amounts of ingredients to your liking. I like to only add hot sauce for spice, then you can put more on it when you are eating it if you want.

JUST WATCH THE VIDEO!

Once you have caught yourself some blue crabs or even bought some live crabs from somewhere you can get them cooked. If you have bought crab meat or whole crab claws or crab legs at the store, typically this meat has already been cooked. Re-cooking it will possibly make it taste better, especially when you cook it in a recipe or something like that.

So to start out, get the largest pot you can find that will fit on your stove. The more crabs you can get into one pot will cut down on the number of cycles you have to do. Once you get it there and not quite full of water, then turn your burner on and wait for it to boil. I did not use any seasoning or “crab boil” with this, because we are going to make crab cakes. So we will be seasoning the crab cake mix. If you want to eat the crabs after you boil them, then maybe you could season the water now.

Putting the Crab in the Pot

1 – Once the water gets to a boil or real close to it, start putting the live crabs in the pot. A pair of tongs are ideal, since the crab pincers are still functional and very hungry for your fingers. Depending on your situation, if you have any crabs that have lost movement, get those crabs into the boiling water first. As you put the live crabs in, you will see the water rise. The water will continue to rise as it gets warmer, so be prepared to take water out if that happens.

2 – Once you have the pot full of as many crabs as will fit (and the water is boiling), then set a timer for 10 minutes. 10 minutes should be sufficient for most crabs. Large crabs, more time, and smaller crabs, less time. I would not cook any crabs for less than 8 minutes. Unless you just have an enormous amount and only a small pot, I would cook them more and not less. You DO NOT want to get sick from eating crab meat that is not cooked.

Trays of Cooked Blue Crabs

3 – Once the timer goes off, start removing the crabs and place on a tray so they can drain. A bowl might work too, but they are still the same size as when you put them in.

4 – After all the crabs have been cooked, they now need to be cleaned. This process will take up a whole other post.

How to Clean Blue Crab for Crab Meat

Put the blue crabs in the fridge

5 – If you need some time in between cooking the crabs and cleaning the crabs, just put them in the refrigerator. Don’t let more than 24 hours pass though, because all the insides are still there. It may be better to process them halfway first, by just removing the top and the insides. Then they can be stored a little longer in the fridge.

JUST WATCH THE VIDEO!

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Tag Archives: crab

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