Crab Cakes

Similar to fish cakes but made with the sweet crab meat, crab cakes are associated with Maryland, where blue crab is plentiful in the Chesapeake Bay. Their popularity has spread to the point where you no longer need to go to Maryland’s east coast to enjoy them.

Traditionally they are made with Crab meat, cracker crumbs, mayonnaise and some spices. Nothing special. Everything tasty.

How to choose crab meat for crab cakes

Crab meat is almost always sold canned or in containers, rather than fresh. The meat is cooked, cleaned and pasteurized.

Common Types of Crab:

• jumbo lump: delicate taste, white color.
• lump: smaller or broken pieces of the jumbo lump meat. Again white color and delicate taste.
• dorsal fin: Commonly used in crab cakes, similar to lump meat but finer in texture.
• hoof meat: pink or brown, tastes more fishy, ​​small pieces of fins and claws.

The best meat for crab cakes is lump or dorsal fin. Lump meat and dorsal fin meat are cheaper than jumbo lump meat. In terms of taste, I prefer it to the hoof meat. If you happen to have fresh crab meat that you cooked yourself from king crab legs, you can use that as well.

Although it’s less expensive, I don’t recommend artificial crab meat. It’s often made from white fish (like pollock) ground into a paste and other things like starch, sugar, egg white, and crab flavoring. There is much less protein and no real crab meat in fake crabs.

crab cake filler and condiments

The fewer fillers (like breadcrumbs and crackers) the better when it comes to crab cakes. While saltines are the traditional Maryland binding ingredient, I use homemade sourdough breadcrumbs for their great flavor and ability to bind well with eggs and mayonnaise.

Note that after mixing the cakes, the filling needs to be kept in the fridge for at least 30 minutes to allow the binder to absorb and hold the cakes together while baking.

spices such as Mustard, Worcestershire, Lemon Juice and Zest and Old Bay Spice are the key to a delicious cake. You should be able to find Old Bay Spice at most supermarkets, but if you can’t find it, combine a pinch each of celery salt, paprika, cayenne and black pepper, powdered mustard, and nutmeg for an Old Bay copy.

Old Bay is worth being around for spicing up devil eggs or popcorn, sprinkling on fish before baking, or using it to make a Bloody Mary with your crab cakes!

Make tips for crab cakes

Since the crab meat is already cooked, you can make it up to 2 days ahead and refrigerate before cooking, or cook, refrigerate up to 2 days, and reheat in the oven.

They can also be frozen, cooked, or uncooked.

• Freeze: Place them in the freezer on a plastic-wrapped tray, and when firm (two to three hours), wrap each in plastic to prevent freezer burn and place in a heavy-duty plastic bag.
• To warm up: Preheat oven to 350oF. Remove the cakes from the freezer directly onto a parchment or foil lined baking sheet. Brush with olive oil and bake from frozen until browned and hot through, about 25 minutes.

Make crab cakes a meal

Crab cakes are served well with a dollop of mayonnaise or tartar sauce, or even cocktail sauce or some other flavorful mayonnaise. Place them on a bed of lettuce, on a bun, or serve with the traditional side of coleslaw. A cold beer or Spicy Bloody Maria would not go amiss either!

Need more seafood? Try these!

• Dungeness Crab Cakes
• Spicy crab cakes with horseradish mayo
• Crab cakes with ginger and lime
• crab dip
• Fish cakes with tarragon mayo
• Classic king crab