Nothing like a little taste of summer to brighten up a dark cold winter’s day. Although fresh crabmeat is preferred, a good quality pasteurized crabmeat will be just fine for crabcakes or a crabmeat stuffing for mushrooms or stuffed flounder. During all my years at Cousin’s Restaurant our famous crabcake was made with just claw meat, and depending upon pricing it could have been fresh or pasteurized. I would make close to 2000 crabcakes for the annual fall block party on Asbury ave, and they would be long gone before the day was over. So here is my recipe for our famous crabcakes.
Crabcakes
2 lbs claw crabmeat
1 bunch of Italian parsley finely chopped
2 Tbsp of Roasted Red Peppers or Fresh Red Peppers finely chopped
1/2 cup of seasoned bread crumbs
Imperial Sauce
1/2 cup Mayonnaise
1 Large Egg
1 Tbsp Sugar
1 Tbsp Old Bay Seasoning
1 dash of Worcestershire Sauce
1 Squeeze of fresh Lemon Juice
if your using pasteurized crabmeat you wont have to worry about shells, if its fresh make sure you pick thru it to get rid of any shells, the nice thing about claw is the shells are very easy to see and you wont find as many as you will in lump or special crabmeat. If you are using pasteurized its a good idea to drain off as much of the liquid as possible. Mix the crabmeat, chopped parsley and red peppers together, set aside.
In another bowl add the mayonnaise, and egg and mix together, then add the sugar, Old Bay, Worcestershire , and lemon juice, mix well. Now add the imperial sauce to the crabmeat and mix together, add in the bread crumbs and work the mixture together.
Let the mixture sit for about 15 minutes before shaping them into crabcakes. The mixture should make 10-12 crabcakes . Any extra crabcakes will freeze easily.
Pre heat the oven to 350 degrees
you can either dredge the crabcakes in bread crumbs and then saute them in a little extra virgin olive oil, for a two minutes on each side to give them a nice golden brown colour, now pop them into the oven and bake for about 20 minutes.
Or you can just place them on a cookie sheet and bake them for about 20 minutes. Just be sure to add a little water to the cookie sheet so they have some moisture to keep them form drying out. Even if you saute them a little water on the pan will help them.
While your crabcakes are in the oven , finish up your side dishes, mix together a little cocktail sauce ( ketchup, prepared horseradish, a dash of Worcestershire sauce and a squeeze of lemon juice) and get ready for a taste of summer.
This crabmeat stuffing can also be used to stuff mushrooms, or as a filling for stuffed flounder, just substitute lump crabmeat for claw meat.
Thanks for this, Dennis: Nora is using this recipe to make crabcakes for my (her dad) birthday dinner tomorrow!