WFDT 02/02/2020

Friends,

It was a lump crab kind of day, so I wanted to experiment with a couple of pounds we had in the fridge. As you all know, we always keep four or five pounds of the fresh stuff in the kitchen. It makes easy and suitable quick snacks for the unexpected guests.

My first idea was to make a roux with flour and cocoa. So I did 2 tsps of Great Value butter with 1.5 tsp of flour and 0.5 tsp of cocoa.



The smell was quite delightful, rich, bready, and roasted. Many south Louisiana cooks like a really dark roux, but I do mine just darker than caramel, but not quite to milk chocolate. I then added heavy cream before adding the crab.





The end product was creamy and earthy with the sweetness of both the crab and the cocoa punctuating the five minutes to prepare dish.



For the next bucket of lump, I wanted to do a quicker version of crabcakes. I melted a couple of tsp of butter and then threw some Panko breadcrumbs in and made a roux-like mixture. I added some Paul Prudhomme's redfish blackening mix with a squirt of ground mustard and made a nice little carbohydrate ready for some protein.



Whilst whistling to my favourite King's College choir Christmas hymns, I dumped a pound of lump in the mix and gently combined.



I thought the end product was better than most crabcakes, with a far better texture and flavor. Best of all it did not require a series of wasted steps to form and fry the cakes.



Yours,
TulaneLSU