AEB classics #38: Crab Roll w/ Pickled Corn

It's that time of year again: M. Bertrand's crab from Gaspé. If you don't believe me, pay a visit to one of Montreal's better restaurants (everywhere from Au Pied de Cochon to Laloux to Reservoir) over the next couple of weeks and keep your eyes open for crab on the menu. You won't be disappointed.

Now, if you can actually get your hands on fresh crabmeat from Gaspésie or you're lucky enough to live in another part of the world where both fresh crabmeat and corn are available at this time of year (the Chesapeake region, say), well, this is a pretty fine way to combine them.

AEB Spicy Crab Roll

250 ml crab meat
1-2 tbsp quality mayonnaise
1/2-1 tsp chipotle purée
1 tbsp red onion, minced
1 tbsp medium-hot pepper (like a Hungarian banana pepper), minced
1 tbsp cilantro, minced
1-2 tbsp pickled corn (recipe below)
salt
freshly ground black pepper

butter
split-top New England/Quebec-style hot dog buns
iceberg lettuce, chopped

Mix the first seven ingredients. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Melt a bit of butter in a skillet and toast you hot dog buns on each side. When your hot dog buns are nice and toasté, add some iceberg lettuce, and then spoon in a generous amount of the crab mixture. Garnish with a little extra pickled corn. Serve and enjoy immediately.

Makes about 6-8 overstuffed crab rolls.

Among the many, many amazing Southern-style condiment recipes in The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook, Pickled Corn has become one of our absolute favorites. It's just so versatile. And the corn flavor is so bright and crisp. Once you have a taste, you'll want to have it with virtually everything: hot dogs and hamburgers, huevos rancheros, black beans, tuna salad, and crab rolls/crab guédilles.

Pickled Corn

4 cups fresh corn kernels, cut from the cob
1 tbsp kosher salt
2 cups distilled white vinegar
2/3 cup water
2 tbsp plus 1 tsp sugar
1 tsp ground turmeric
1/4 tsp ground mace
1 whole clove

Sterilize 2 pint-sized, wide-mouth jars and accompanying lids. Set aside.

In a large bowl, toss the corn with the salt. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and set aside.

In a 3-quart pot, combine the vinegar, water, sugar, and spices. Bring to a simmer over medium heat and continue to simmer for 20 minutes, uncovered. The vinegar will be fragrant, it will be infused with the spices, and it'll have a bright yellow tint to it because of the turmeric.

Add the corn. Bring to a low boil over medium-high heat and boil for 5 minutes. The corn will soften slightly but should still be crisp and will have absorbed some of the flavor of the vinegar brine.

With a slotted spoon, transfer the corn into your sterilized jars. Carefully pour the hot liquid over the corn (using a funnel, if necessary) until it is 1/2 inch from the rim. Place the lids on the jars and seal. Allow them to cool, then store in the refrigerator. The corn and spice flavors will meld nicely after about 24 hours and will continue to steep and take on flavor for the next week. Pickled corn keeps for about 4 weeks in the refrigerator. Good luck keeping it that long.

[recipe from The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook]

aj

Top Ten #20

1. crab, crab tacos, crab louie

2. eating your way through the strip malls of Northern Virginia

3. Ways of Escape, Graham Greene



4. Upper Saranac Lake, NY



5. The Burden of Dreams, dir. Les Blank

6. esquites

7. A Study in Scarlet, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

8. eating your way across Vancouver

9. Effi Briest, Theodor Fontane

10. Breakfast Lunch Tea, Rose Carrarini

8/29/07

24 clams (and then some)

I'm not sure what got into us. Partly it was the memory of our trip to David Chang's Momofuku #1 last June, and my lingering regret over balking on his Long Island Razor Clams* with Kurowycky Sausage. Partly it was because of a desire to go back to La Mer to take a closer look at their astounding oyster selection. Whatever the case, the other day we up and hopped into Putney, our trusty, rusty '89 Jetta, and made our way back down to La Mer. When we emerged, a half an hour later, we had 24 Littleneck clams*, a small assortment of oysters from P.E.I., N.Y., and B.C., and, by some strange twist of fate, a single Dungeness crab from Alaska. Don't ask. I swear we never go this crazy (okay, almost never), but Michelle just couldn't take her eyes off those crab tanks and before I knew it I'd locked eyes too.

Anyway, we headed back home, opened up a bottle of wine (I mean, at this point, what the hell, right?), and got to work. We brought a pot of salted water to boil and threw our crab in. Then we prepared our clams according to the following recipe, one that's just a slight variation on a recipe that appeared in the New York Times almost exactly a year ago:

Momofuku-style Clams with Kielbasa

4 tbsp grapeseed oil or other neutral oil like corn or canola
1/4 onion, chopped finely
salt and pepper
24 clams, Razor, Littleneck, or Manila, scrubbed
1/4 lb smoked kielbasa
1/2 cup sake
2 tbsp finely chopped scallions
1 tbsp minced ginger
1/4 cup light soy sauce
1 tbsp sherry vinegar
chopped fresh jalapeños for garnish

Put the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and add the onions, salt, and pepper when the oil is hot; cook for a minute or two, stirring from time to time, until the onions soften and begin to brown a bit.

Add the clams and raise the heat to high, stirring for another minute. Add the kielbasa and stir again for a minute.

Add the sake, cover, and cook until the clams are tender or open (if you're using Littlenecks or Manilas), about 5 minutes. If applicable, discard any clams that don't open.

Meanwhile, combine the remaining oil with scallions, ginger, soy sauce and vinegar in a bowl.

Put the clams, onions, sausage and their juices in a bowl and spoon sauce over them. Garnish with jalapeños and serve.

Makes 4 servings; more if served as a side.

When we'd finished preparing the clams, the crab was fully cooked, so Michelle, in a bold show of just how pastry-kitchen-hardened she's become, plunged her hand into the boiling water and pulled him out. Somehow, miraculously, her hand reemerged unscathed, and I was there to document this phenomenon photographically:



The only thing left to do was shuck those Raspberry Point (P.E.I.), Flower (N.Y.), and, best of all, Virginika (B.C.) oysters, place 'em on a platter and seat ourselves à table.

We never have these kind of all-seafood extravaganzas. It wasn't the most cost-efficient meal of all time, but it was absolutely worth every last penny. We melted butter for the Dungeness crab and quartered a lemon for the oysters, but both were so good, so sweet, so naturally briny that we ended up eating them unadorned. The clams had that special David Chang genius: a kind of intuitive type of fusion that's unfussy and surprisingly, refreshingly unselfconscious (in this case, an Asian/East Village riff on that classic Iberian combination of clams and pork).

The cats were happy (they got their very first taste of Dungeness crab). We were happy. Win-win.

aj

* So named because of their startling resemblance to a sheathed straight blade.

** They had razor clams, too, but they didn't look nearly as fresh as they do in NYC, while the Littlenecks, on the other hand, looked great.

A Pound of Crabmeat, or Two Crab Recipes in Two Days

We fell in love with M. Bertrand from a distance earlier this year when we read about him in Gourmet magazine’s profile of Martin Picard—a profile which dealt in large part with Picard’s relationship to high-quality, small-scale suppliers such as Bertrand. It had something to do with that disarming smile and that trademark straw hat of his,



but mostly it had to do with the descriptions of his garden and his fantastic organic produce. When M. Bertrand started to coming by Les Chèvres again this year to make his regular deliveries, Michelle finally worked up the courage to say hello, and late in the summer she asked him if the two of us might be able to stop by his garden some day to take a look around. He very kindly told her “yes,” and a couple of weeks later we made our little pilgrimage to his large garden out near Mirabel.

We’ll have more to say about this visit later, but one thing we didn’t realize before we talked to him that fine summer morning was that M. Bertrand’s cottage business is about much more than just fruits, herbs, and vegetables. He also distributes seafood, and especially Quebec crabs, harvested by his brother-in-law in the Gaspé region of eastern Quebec. He told us all about the crab feasts he’d been having and we were nearly beside ourselves with envy, but we maintained our composure and decided that we’d try to procure some of M. Bertrand’s crab through the restaurant at a later date. That later date was late last week. Michelle came home late one night and she showed up with a pound of M. Bertrand’s finest Rock Crab lump crabmeat in tow. It looked and tasted so good we decided we’d try to stretch out into two meals. And that’s exactly what we did.

Meal #1: crab cakes

I spent a good part of my youth in the Washington-Baltimore metro area, so I know a thing or two about a good crab cake. Michelle, on the other hand, had only ever had the overly breaded, overly fried hockey-puck variety that you find from time to time at receptions. She had an inkling of what a real crab cake might taste like, but she’d yet to experience a true crab cake epiphany. I’d never made what I would call a blue ribbon crab cake, but, then again, I hadn’t made a crab cake of any sort in years, and after years of drought I was eager. And with John and Matt Lewis Thorne’s Pot on the Fire in our corner we were pretty sure we’d manage to make a crab cake that packed a punch.

Originally we’d been thinking dinnertime for the crab cakes, but things took a swift turn. I began reading the Thornes’ chapter on “Crustaceans & Crumbs” and I noticed a footnote that cited an 1897 crab cake recipe from Marietta Hollyday’s Domestic Economy as being the earliest known crab cake recipe of any kind. The recipe was entitled “Crab Cakes for Breakfast (Very nice).” It was then that I knew we had no other recourse but to make our crab cakes for breakfast. Crab cakes are a bit of a brunch staple, of course, but with a couple of eggs over-easy and some sautéed chorizo I thought they might make for pretty mean breakfast too. And this way, ever so obliquely, we’d be communing with the very origins of the crab cake.

We followed the Thornes’ advice and steered clear of the croquette-type crab cake. Instead, we followed their Pigeon Hill Bay version, which seemed to have just the lightness of touch we were looking for, eschewing all that business that clutters most crab cakes in favor of a crab cake that lets its crabmeat shine.

Pigeon Hill Bay Crab Cakes

[Advance warning: This recipe is very simple, but it requires 1-2 hours of chilling time in the refrigerator so that the crab cakes firm up to the point that they can be fried properly.]

1 pound crabmeat, checked carefully for shell fragments
2 or 3 Saltine crackers, crumbled by hand
2 tbsp mayonnaise
1 generous dash Tabasco sauce
1/2 tsp spicy brown mustard
1 tbsp minced parsley
1/4 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper to taste
3 to 4 tbsp butter for frying

Put the crabmeat in a mixing bowl and crumble the Saltine crackers into it. Blend the mayonnaise, Tabasco sauce, mustard, and parsley together, turn into the crabmeat mixture, and sprinkle this with the salt and black pepper. Using your fingers (or a rubber spatula), gently toss to produce a loosely textured crab salad.

[Frankly, if you can’t take it any longer you can quit here and just devour that salad, but we encourage you to see the recipe through. You won’t regret it.]

Take a biscuit cutter and set it on a large plate. Spoon approximately 1/8 of the crab mixture into the ring, tapping the ring gently when full to settle it. Remove the ring, set it elsewhere on the plate and repeat until you have 8 crab cakes. Put the plate in the refrigerator and let the crab cakes firm for 1-2 hours.

Meanwhile, to prevent the crab cakes from burning, put the butter in a heatproof measuring cup and place it in an oven turned to its lowest setting. After 15 minutes—or when the butter has turned clear and the butter solids have settled to the bottom of the cup—pour the liquid onto a griddle or large skillet, leaving behind and then discarding the butter solids.

When the moment of truth has arrived, remove the plate from the refrigerator. Heat the clarified butter in the griddle over medium-high heat. When the butter is hot, slide a thin-edged spatula under each crab cake ever so gently, and, with the gentlest of shakes, slip it onto the hot griddle. Fry the cakes until the bottoms are golden brown, about 2 minutes, then turn them over to cook on the other side. Serve at once (for breakfast, brunch, lunch, or dinner) with tartar sauce, preferably freshly made.

[Note: We halved this recipe so that we’d only used 1/2 of our crab. It made 4 beautiful crab cakes, just enough for a lovely Sunday breakfast.]



Meal #2: crab pasta

The next day we decided we’d be making some kind of pasta dish with the remaining crab. Those of you out there who’ve read us before know just how crazy we are about peas. Well, this year we’d frozen a bunch of our fresh pea haul and we’d been waiting for just the right occasion to bust them out. This seemed like the one. I’d experimented with pasta, seafood, and peas before, so I was pretty sure of where I wanted to go with this dish. I turned to a pasta with lobster and peas recipe from Tom Colicchio’s Think Like a Chef for a few pointers (quite a few, actually), but I had the idea that leeks and saffron might round out my variation nicely. The cream sauce turned into a work of art, and it made just enough to coat the noodles evenly without overwhelming the other flavors. We couldn’t have been happier with the results. Michelle quickly opened a bottle of wine and we sat down to savor the last of M. Bertrand’s crab. Just how good was it? Well, it instantly became one of Michelle’s favorite dishes of all time.

Fettucine with Crab and Peas

1 lb fettucine, preferably fresh
1 tbsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 pinch high-quality saffron, crushed in a mortar + 1 tiny pinch saffron, uncrushed
1 leek, cleaned thoroughly and minced
sea salt
2 cups peas
1/2 lb fresh lump crabmeat
1 1/2 cups fish stock
1/2 tsp tomato paste
1 cup heavy cream
freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp fresh chives, minced
2 tbsp fresh parsley, minced

In a heavy saucepan, heat the oil over medium heat. Add your garlic and sauté for one minute. Add the pinch of saffron and leek and sauté for about 5-10 minutes, until wilted. Salt to taste.

Meanwhile, add the tiny pinch of saffron to the fish stock and bring the stock to a simmer in a medium-sized pot over medium heat. Add the tomato paste and continue to cook over medium to medium-high heat until reduced by two-thirds (in other words, you should be left with roughly 1/2 cup of stock and the stock should have intensified considerably). Whisk in the cream, then simmer the mixture until it has reduced enough so that it coats the back of a spoon, about 10 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste and keep the sauce warm over very low heat, stirring occasionally.

When the leeks are wilted, add the peas and cook them until just tender, but still crisp. Adjust the seasoning if necessary. Remove the leek and pea mixture from the heat.

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil and cook the fettucine until al dente.

When the pasta is just about done, add the leek and pea mixture along with half of the minced herbs to the cream sauce and heat through.

When the pasta is done, drain thoroughly and add to the cream sauce. Toss gently a couple times to begin coating the pasta with the sauce, the leeks and the peas. Add the crabmeat and the remaining herbs and toss everything very gently until just mixed. The crabmeat will heat through in the time that you toss it, without losing its delicate flavor.

Serve immediately.

Serves 4 for dinner, with side salad and plenty of crusty bread to sop up that delicious sauce.

aj

M. Bertrand photo courtesy of Gourmet