It’s high crab season here at my camp, appropriately named Hurricane Landing located on Hurricane Bayou that runs into the Tensaw River. On Friday, I caught 84 giant Blue Crabs in four hours of crabbing. There are trillions of crabs in the river which is comprised of brackish water so you have both fresh and saltwater species living together.
There’s no better way to prepare crabs than using Old Bay seasoning. I prefer to clean the crabs prior to steaming them in beer. I layer the cleaned crabs into the steamer and shake Old Bay over each layer of crabs. Cook twenty minutes and you have one of the great treats of Lower Alabama living.
Some of the crabs, I clean to make Crab Cakes. Even Obama lovers love crab cakes. Their taste buds apparently are not politically atrophied. I like to eat crab cakes with a dill sauce or with Crystal Oyster sauce.
My biggest crab on Friday was 12 inches from point to point on the shell. The lump, the largest piece meat inside a crab located adjacent to the crab’s swimming flipper, was enormous in this particular Goliath crab. Sometimes, there is almost nothing inside a crab. It happens just after losing their old shell. In Pensacola, we have stone crabs in the rocky portion of the bay and sound. When I lived in Miami, I used to eat Stone Crabs at the Tastee Inn out there on the Trail where they built FIU. I don’t think the place still exists, but it was a great seafood restaurant in the 1950’s.
Thinking back, I remember Ft. Lauderdale and Pompano were separated by five miles of forest in which there was only one building: Porky’s Hideaway. What a great bar, absolutely legendary. South Florda was wonderful when there were fewer people there, and most people called Miami–Miamuh.
I never knew Porky’s was based on Porky’s Hideaway in the Glades. I guess I’ve never seen the movie anyway, as notorious as it was.
I have Old Bay in my spice drawer for sure, but I’m not a fan of crustaceans. It makes a damn good spice for cheese fries though.
Porky’s was located off Federal Hwy about six or seven blocks north of Oakland Park Blvd. It was part of the City of Oakland Park. It sat back from the road and its back faced a small lake. One day, they found Porky’s body, dead floating in the lake. It was reputed to be mob inspired. For young horn dogs like me, it was the place to be.
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I live in Maryland, where crabs and crab cakes are just short of religion. I will say, I was gratified to hear that you steam your crabs rather than boil them as is common practice in a lot of places. In Maryland, boiling crabs is considered crab heresy.
As a PSA… while Old Bay gets the press, a lot of the crab shacks and restaurants around here use J.O.s #2 crab seasoning (https://jospices.com/) for steamed crabs. Old Bay is made in Maryland, and so is JO’s. In my opinion, and the opinion of a lot of Maryland crab connoisseurs, it’s better than Old Bay for steaming crabs. The JOs has a coarser salt which is perfect for steaming as it won’t melt off the crabs like Old Bay does. Old Bay is great for other foods, but for if you are looking to recreate the Maryland crab shack/restaurant experience, JO’s is the way to go. It’s what they use.
JO’s also makes several versions for special tastes… extra spicy, or garlic, or a pepper version.
But for the classic, Maryland crab shack flavor, the JO’s #2 all day.
PS Standard disclaimer. I do not work for, represent, nor own stock in JO’s. Just a fan of their products, wanting to share the secret to fantastic, Maryland-style crab.
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Never heard of them. Do people say “Joe’s” or do they say “Jay Oh’s” ?
I’m going to give the J.O. a try. Thanks for the recommendation. I’ve eaten crabs in Baltimore, and they were the best I’ve ever had. A lot of people around here are from Louisiana and use Tony Chachere’s spices, especially when they boil crawfish. I’m not a fan of boiling seafood with exception of Sheephead whose fillets I’ll boil and sometimes mix with crab meat making combo crab/fish cakes. I make killer crab cakes.
I like to smoke fish. Smoked mullet is a staple here on the Gulf Coast, however, nothing beats smoked salmon or trout. In South Florida, they don’t eat mullet or trigger fish. Both are excellent food fish. Mullet has to be eaten fresh, never frozen. Pensacola is a seafood wonderland, having one of the largest sea food markets in the country. It’s called Capt Joe Patti’s and after Pensacola Beach, it is the largest tourist attraction in Pensacola. Pensacola has grown substantially, and is now the largest metro area between New Orleans and Tampa. It has a baseball team, a college football team, a symphony orchestra, an opera, and an epic downtown bar/entertainment complex called Seville Quarter.
Speaking of smoke, now that my heart is doing better, I’ve fallen off the wagon and back to smoking cigars. Presently, I’ve been smoking Pepin Garcia’s My Father cigars. My favorite Garcia cigars are the Connecticut and San Cristobal. Cigar smoking is an expensive habit. Ordinarily $500 of my money goes up in smoke each month. Nothing is worse than cheap cigars; they’re awful, intolerable. No matter where you go, you meet splendid, interesting persons at cigar lounges. Not too long ago, I went to a cigar store in Fairhope, AL, a rich Baldwin County enclave on the east side of Mobile Bay which is like California in Alabama. I met there Nick Perdomo who is a Canes fan but whose daughter attends UA in Tuscaloosa. Nick and I got along splendidly because we both share in common a mutual detestation of Barack and Big Mike Obama.
Good question. The latter.
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I went to a pretty cool outdoor bar grass area with a view of the water in Pensacola. From someone used to big cities it was A-OK. My dad lives close to Pensacola. Maybe one day I’ll have a drink and a cigar with you, bikki. No crab though.
