Crab Cakes
Crab cakes will instantly elevate any meal with its crisp exterior, and a rich, yet delicate interior.
These cakes are not the common crab cakes found at receptions and restaurants that are lackluster with more filler and seasonings than crab. While I love seasoning, you have to be careful with it because it will quickly overpower the sweet crab taste. My theory is that it’s the sign of cheaper crab cakes that are more bread than crab in the hopes you won’t notice the lack of crab.
These crab cakes would make an appearance at “Sunday dinners”, my favorite dinner of the week. It was when my mom would cook the “fancy” food with multiple courses and a time for us to slow down before the week started. She recently told me that is what she missed the most after we (my siblings and I) moved out.
This is my mom’s recipe that is heavily based on the crab cakes in The New Orleans Cookbook by Rima and Richard Collin.
Crab Cakes Ingredients
1 lb crabmeat
2 slices of dried bread, broken into small pieces
2 large eggs
1 tsp mustard
½ tsp salt
½ tsp ground white pepper
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 Tbl mayonnaise
2 Tbl minced parsley
2 tsp lemon juice
3 Tbl clarified butter for frying
Crab Cakes Directions
In a medium-sized glass bowl, add all of the ingredients except for the clarified butter and mix thoroughly yet gently with using your hands. The mixture should be wet.
Grab enough mixture to form a 2” ball between your palms. Squeeze your palms gently to create a fat patty. It should hold its shape but you should question if it will fall apart. If it doesn’t hold its shape, add an additional ½ slice of bread pieces to the bowl and mix.
Heat ½ of the butter in a large frying pan. When it gets hot, put a small piece of crab mixture in the pan. It should sizzle then continue cooking as a softer sizzle. Adjust the heat accordingly.
Add patties to the pan. You don’t want to crowd the patties because it will be hard to flip them. When the underside of the patty is dark golden brown, gently slide your spatula under the patty to flip it. If it sticks, gently push the spatula back and forth until the cake releases from the pan. Cook the underside until dark golden brown.
Repeat the process with the remaining butter and patties.
Notes
If you use crab meat from seasoned boiled crabs (in place of the unseasoned crab meat), you’ll have an even better crab cake.
If you don’t have white pepper, use black pepper.
