A taste of the `beautiful swimmers'
Guest Column
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For those of you who have spent more than one day in Baltimore, the jagged, multi-appendaged carapace of the Maryland Blue Crab is a familiar icon.
And rightly so, being that they make great civic decorations, turbo-badass substitutes for fighting cocks, and, incidentally, the best food available in The Land of Pleasant Living. (Freshmen, read your beer cans).
People have been eating these frisky arthropods for at least hundreds of years along the brackish waters of the Chesapeake.
The species, Callinectes sapidus or «beautiful swimmer that tastes good,»can actually be found along the entire Eastern Seaboard.
However, it is in the tidewaters and rivers of the Chesapeake estuarine system where they have become most distinctly part of food culture.
Tragically, pollution and overfishing have limited the supply of crabs in the Bay and have prompted the government to impose fishing limits and other regulations regarding commercial crabbing in 1994.
In short, crabs aren't cheap, but they're a luxury every Marylander and by proxy, every Hopkid, should be able to enjoy.
The crab, like Baltimore itself, takes work, commitment and endurance to enjoy. Baltimore will cut you up real good if you find yourself in the wrong place, just as the crab will slice your fingers if they wander to one of countless sharp edges of the shell.
But if you're smart, patient, and hard-working, you'll find an experience as good as any in the world.
Yes, everyone who has had hardshell blue crabs knows that they can be quite a hassle.
Should one find himself ordering a few dozen crabs at a local crabhouse of repute, one should not be surprised to find the creatures to come whole, steamed and unprocessed save for a robust dusting of some spicy seasoning. The rest of the meal's preparation is left to the customer. Fret not, dear novice! This act of «picking» is what makes a good food a great food experience.
Picking, or cleaning, the crab seems at first a daunting task to the beginner, but becoming familiar with the anatomy of the crab can be a delightful demonstration of the convenience of eating nature.
Granted, we are required to remove the legs, separate the top half of the shell from the bottom, clean out all the organ-related junk inside, and meticulously remove the remaining meat (the coveted lump backfin) from multiple variously sized chitin chambers.
But luckily for us, the crab includes all the tools we need to get the job done with grand style and efficiency.
Some purists, myself included, will refuse to introduce any foreign object into the crab picking process lest it disrupt the meditative focus that one can enjoy when the crab (temporarily, alas) becomes the object of all desire and the source of all concerns in one's life.
And also, people viciously banging mallets against crab legs tend to spray crabby fluid all over the table making everything a bit too messy and loud for a civilized dinner.
Most experienced crab enthusiasts will have their own techniques and quirks, and I highly recommend that the uninitiated find one of these people for their «first times.»
A crab feast need not be a solemn experience, of course; crab feasts also happen to be some of the best times for a group of friends to get together, get really messy and smell like Old Bay and decomposing sealife for a few hours.
If you live in a house with some spare room, I recommend purchasing a bushel, picking up a case or two of Natty Boh (bottles), and wasting the afternoon away amidst good camaraderie and splendid food, not to mention a great deal of Maryland pride and cultural relevance.
If you approach the crab in a way that you'd approach a Uni Mini Chicken Parm, you'll probably end up somewhat unsatisfied.
Picking crabs takes time and it's generally inconceivable to become «stuffed» by just eating crab meat. If the feaster can muster up some heroic crab picking skills, he need not eat anything else. To be safe, though, I recommend boiling some fresh corn or making/getting a good quantity of fried chicken for those less inclined to pick for hours.
If you don't have any place to pick them at home, Baltimore has plenty of crabhouses to pile dozens of freshly steamed crabs on paper covered tables.
Most importantly, they haul the the stinking carcasses away from you when you're done. Try going downtown to the Harbor or Fells if you've never been to a crabhouse. Obrycki's on East Pratt Street in Fells Point is a popular tourist destination and a Baltimore classic. If you've had crab experiences in the past, there's no excuse for going to the same places again and again. Collect a group of friends and find new places to gain an appreciation for Baltimore as a unique city instead of some sort of sleazier version of New York or Philadelphia.
The traditional season will be ending soon, as the crabs begin to burrow into the mud and spend their winter dormant, so hurry up and get them -- there's no better city.