Crab questions

[akebono]

here in the Chesapeake Bay area

its all about the backfin.

blue crab lump.

the stuff of legend.

when i was a kid

i only ate the claws.

-m

[highchef]

Claw meat is 'stronger', but I'm not sure that makes it better. I think it all has to do with what you're using it for. There's nothing like crab cakes, with beautiful, mild, tender pieces of crabmeat barely holding together with just the minimum of filler and lovely crisp green onion. It just is not the same sensation when done with crab claw, not the same mouth feel, not the same insane crab 'rush' you get when you taste the sea itself in the white meat.

Now, for stuffing, it's the right time for claw meat..you're using it as an ingredient with lots of other flavors to play off of, it's the star of the show but isn't the dealmaker. I love clawmeat in mushrooms..such a simple thing but soooo sweet! I know what you meat about the price difference, it's daunting. But I pay for the white for salad and cakes. I cannot stand the fake stuff. I won't get started on it, cause I know there are people out there who like it, but you'd never eat that 'dip' again if you tried mine alongside it. I'm not bragging, just telling it like it is.

[Kent Wang]

What is backfin?

I have half a pound of claw meat in the frige now. Can you give me a good stuffing recipe? The stuffed mushrooms sound intriguing, what mushrooms do you use?

[highchef]

What is backfin?

I have half a pound of claw meat in the frige now. Can you give me a good stuffing recipe? The stuffed mushrooms sound intriguing, what mushrooms do you use?

←

Basic, large white mushrooms, stems removed, caps cleaned. finely chop stems and about a cup and a half of trinity...1/3 onion, 1/3 bellpepper, 1/3 celery. also finely chopped. Sautee all in 1/2 stick us butter. Add fresh tarragon (just a bit), salt and pepper to taste, a couple of tablespoons of fresh parsley, about a third of a cup of finely sliced green onion along with a splash of hot sauce and just enough panko to give some body. stuff the caps and broil until hot and the caps are tender. I've topped them with a dollop of white sauce before heating, or freshly grated cheese (something mild). If you don't care for tarragon, use thyme. A squeeze of lemon on top when they come out is good...great teasers.

My mil used to do them 'italian' style from a recipe she got from Mosca's in N.O., but all the cheese and Italian spices overpowered the taste of the crabmeat and I'm all about the crabmeat. They're good though, you can make them just like the above, but sub italian seasoning and add parm and romano on top before broiling. and use Italian bread crumbs.

[fifi]

I think back fin is what we call lump crabmeat here. It is the same blue crab we have here in the Gulf Coast area.

I like claw meat myself, particularly for gumbo and other stew like preparations. I agree on the flavor. If I want to gild the lily, I will serve some of the lump on the side to be added to the gumbo at the table. The delicate flavor seems to be preserved better that way.

[willows]

So we made chilli crab for dinner tonight, and it was delicious. However, my paranoid girlfriend became concerned about dark black striations on the cooked meat-- mostly around the joints. The claw meat was almost uniformly black. Now, the black bit was mostly on the surface of the meat-- the interior of the flesh was all a lovely, creamy white. We bought these dungeoness crabs already cooked, and basically tossed them in the stir-fried sauce at the end.

Was it cooking technique? Spoilage? Just an idiosyncrasy of this type of crab? It didn't taste spoiled, but then, we used a lot of salted thai chilis and siracha.

[savvysearch]

I can't find this info anywhere. How much crab meat approximately is in a 2 lb crab?

[OliverB]

good question. They throw out quite some "stuff" when they clean it out, and the shells are probably of a good weight. I probably would expect to get less than one lb out of a 2lb crab, if that much. If you need a certain amount of crab meat, you might be better off just buying the meat already removed. More expensive by the lb, but probably justifiable? Google brings up some info for blue crab, I did not dig much deeper. But if you google "how much meat in a crab" or something like that you might find something.

[Chris Amirault]

What kind of crab are we talking about? Blue? Dungeness? Stone?

[Dave the Cook]

These folks, who should know, say the yield is about 25%.

[David Ross]

I'd like to add another note about the yield of meat from a Dungeness Crab. According to my fish guy, and proven through my own experiences, deep-water Dungeness crabs fished out of the Pacific are larger in size with harder shells than the crabs harvested out of bays. The deep-water crabs tend to have firmer meat and a slightly higher ratio of meat to shell. In the end though, I'd agree with what the folks at the Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission report--expect no more than about a 25% yield--regardless of where the crabs live.

The Dungeness Crab season in Oregon and Washington typically begins on December 1, weather and conditions permitting. We avoid buying Dungeness this time of year, preferring to wait a couple more months until the season opens and the first, fresh crabs start to show up in our markets.

[Peter the eater]

25% is a good yield for cold water snow crab which are leggy and without the big crusher claws you find on other crustaceans. A good lobster gets you 40% because of the claws and tail.

[Fat Guy]

I don't think I've ever accomplished more than about a 25% yield by weight from a lobster. I use 10% as my rule of thumb for crab. Not that I cook it often enough to have a rule of thumb. But once in a blue moon when I buy and prepare crab I assume 10% of the weight will be the servable meat portion. People who are really experienced with crabs will get more. Dungeness will yield a lot higher than the crabs we see in the East -- that's part of what makes them desirable. Which is to say the 25% number sounds credible for an experienced cook, but if I did it I'd probably get 20%.

Edited October 17, 2009 by Fat Guy (log)

[savvysearch]

Thanks guys. Taking apart the dungeness. With this one, I estimated about 15%.

[JAZ]

I think it definitely depends on how experienced and determined the crab picker is. I know my brother can get every last shred of meat from a Dungeness, and I'm sure his yield is 10% higher than mine. That being said, I think 25% is a good average for Dungeness.

[Chris Amirault]

Crab-eaters, why not grab your scale and weigh (1) pre-cooking weight whole, (2) cooked weight whole, and (3) meat yield? Also indicate type of crab.

[Peter the eater]

I don't think I've ever accomplished more than about a 25% yield by weight from a lobster.

I got 120 grams of edible flesh from a small 325 gram lobster here: Nova Scotia Eats, post #96

I can't speak for the crabs, but with lobsters the molting cycle makes a big difference. Freshly molted soft shell lobsters have a lot of room inside the exoskeleton for future growth. Hard shell lobsters are packed with meat.

[Ron Seale]

Just for fun, I bought live crabs, cooked and cleaned them and weighed the meat. Turns out that crab meat from the same store (Uwajimaya, Seattle)was slightly less expensive. go figure.