How to Cook Soft Shell Crab

Video Transcript

"All right we are back to show you the soft shell crabs and I've got a non-stick Teflon saute pan with some hot clarified butter in it. I've got about a medium flame, a little bit overload going on there and we've got a nice nutty aroma coming off that real rich clarified butter which is nice and we want to make sure that this clarified butter is nice and hot before the crabs go in there because we want a nice hot oil so that we get a sear; a nice even sear in a quick cooking time for both sides of these guys. Again, this is the soft shelled crab that we just dusted once in flour. We went straight into all purpose flour with no seasoning whatsoever and dusted them one time which is a traditionally way. It's just dredging and dusting. The other guy we put in flour first and then we did a milk and egg wash on the second step and then the third step we used just a store bought seafood fry mixture which is a corn meal mixture of assorts that you can use on oysters or shrimp or fish and it works just as well on the crab. So we've got just enough oil here. We don't want to saturate these guys but it is nice and hot and ready to go. Again, I am wearing my gloves so that I don't leave finger prints on these guys and we don't knock any of the breading off. We get a good nice sear. I'm going to go ahead and do the tops of these first because that will be kind of our presentation sign on the plate. We've got a good nice sear. That's what we want to hear. Again, I'm going to do the tops first and then the bottoms. I like these in a non-stick Teflon saute pan just because it keeps these guys sliding around and that it is a real nice slick surface for these guys to cook on. I'm going to remove these gloves and show you the fish spatula that I am going to use. If you notice, this is tapered back toward the handle on a little wire here but it is nice and thin and it kind of scoops up this way and it is a fish spatula for that very reason, for general fillets and things so we don't tear them; it is fluted which helps too. I am just going to swirl these guys around in that clarified butte so we get a nice even color on them. We'll come back here in just a bit and flip these guys over and show you what kind of color we are looking to get."