Hi, there. I’m Matt, from the Underground Cookery School. Another cracker of a dish. I’m going to show you how to do a dress crab with spring onion and chili.
So, what this video is about is how to prepare a crab. I’m going to make a very simple salad with some spring onion and rock it, nice and seasonal. But before we do anything, what I’m going to do is put this little fellow . . . Not so little. Is he? I’ve got a pan of boiling salted water, and this just goes in for six or seven minutes. Then, we’re going to get him out, let it cool down, and I’m going to show you how to prep a crab.
Right. Well, this crab is now ready. So, I’m going to get it out. I’m going to let this cool down for a couple of minutes because it’s going to be quite hot. You can run some cold water over it, which is probably what I’ll do. So, the next shot that you see will be of me and a nice, cool crab.
Right. So, the first thing we need to do is take the legs off. This is going to make it easier. There’s two sorts of meat in a crab. There’s white, and there’s dark. The bulk of the white crab meat is in the claws, and the way that we get these open is just break it up into four pieces, like that. This is a clean teetale. So, please don’t write in and complain. You can use a hammer. I’m going to use a rolling pin, and we’re just going to . . . There we go. That should do it.
So, what I’m now going to do . . . Look. This is a great example of this claw. We’re going to peel this off, and look. You’ve got all that lovely crab meat there. Then, over here, there’s crab meat in here. So, you can push that through and into there. There we go. I mean, this is cooked really nicely. You definitely don’t want to overcook a crab. That would be a shame. You do get large pieces of shell in there. So, you have to go through them later on.
What I want to focus on now is the main . . . It’s called the carrot piece. So, we’ll move that over, which is here. This is where you find all the dark crab meat, but what you can do is just below the mouth, you open it up. There we go. You’ll find that there is sort of smatterings of white crab meat in here. Most of it is dark, actually.
The dark meat tends to get used for stocks and things like that, thickening soups, you know, for a crab baste. Most people won’t eat it. And also, with the white crab meat, you can sometimes use this, you know, for presentation purposes, to put that in there. I mean, it doesn’t look terribly appetizing. But just over here, you know, you can get tiny little bit out.
So, what I’m going to do next is I’m going to make a very quick mayonnaise, and then we’re going to dress that and make a little salad out of it. I’m going to show you how to make a mayonnaise, and we’re going to then dress the crab with the mayo. Now, I had some egg yolks knocking around, and I didn’t want to waste them. Put that in there, and then I’m going to put some lemon juice and some vinegar and a pinch of salt, and then plenty of mustard, which is going to bind this all together. Mix it. So, we get a nice, thick dressing.
Now, what’s going to happen is . . . You put the oil in, in sort of gradual degrees. Otherwise, it splits. So, I’m going to do this for the next minute or two, until I get a nice mayonnaise, or one that I’m happy with. Right. Well, I’m very happy with that. It’s definitely a nice, thick, mayonnaise-y texture, a bit of Tabasco and Worcestershire sauce in there. You can also put small drop ketchup in and get a mari rose dressing. I think it needs a pinch of salt. That should do it.
Right. I’m happy with that. What I’m now going to do is dress the crab. So, let’s move those out of the way. I’m just going to do this. It doesn’t matter that there’s some mustard in there, because that’s just extra flavor. I’m just going to stick it in, and then just mix it up. It’s spring, so some spring onions go in, and a little bit of chili. Those can go in. Just give that a good old mix up.
So, I’m just going to pile this in, so that we get a nice sort of restaurant-y finish to the dish. Just press that down. There we go. And then, just going to put a little bit of cress on there, you know, just gives it a bit of height and makes it look a bit more passionate. A tiny bit of olive oil around there, and there you have it, a really wonderful spring crab salad. Now, go and make that. You’ll really love it.
It’s that competition time again. The way it works is if you leave a nice review, having been down here on either Google or Facebook or even just like me on Facebook, your name goes into the pan, and if I pull it out, we send a paster machine out to you. So, today’s winner is Kim Stitson . So, Kim, paster machine is going to work its way out to you.
Next time, I’m going to show you how to cook a lobster, how to get the meat out, make a little salad with it, you know. Fantastic dish. Look out for that one, and thanks for watching.
