How To Steam EXTRA Flavor in (Light) Blue Crabs 🦀Watermen Tips

welcome to the chesapeake bay in maryland where blue crabs are king if you've ever lived by the bay you might have a base of knowledge from your crab eating experiences but as i've discovered there's always something new to learn captain cj of fv miss paula grew up on the water and is a commercial crabber wrapping up his 20th season the captain shares his knowledge with this four part steam crab series to pass along tips and tricks on how to steam a big pot of crabs light crabs females heavy crabs and even dead crabs hopefully this will make you a little more savvy when you go out for crabs or purchase carryout so first up the lights so what's a lighter crab the way we tell here you can see this crab is pretty dirty he's got some growth on them starting to get some color on them but what we do here in maryland is we squeeze the sides on all our crabs so if you if you look this crab's got just a little bit of flex so depending on how much flex you have is how long it's been since that crab shed is shell this crab here is starting to get fairly firm it's getting dirty this one may steam up and actually have a fair bit of meat in it typically the lights a lot of times can be watery because they haven't filled all the way back in yet they haven't hardened off and they haven't filled all the meat back in because they grow so when they shed their shell they're going to grow an inch or so so they have to fill all that back in over time it takes a couple weeks so these crabs typically are sold cheaper a lot of times dollar dollar fifty crabs uh they're sold separately from good hard crabs so most of the time they're just sold not by size they're sold by whether they're hard crab or they're a light crab these are called junk crabs trash crabs picking crabs summer crabs lots of different names some people saw them as good crabs you get a crab you order crabs and you get one in there you open it up and it's got a little bit of water in the meat you pull the legs out and let the meat all comes out of them those crabs are what we would call light crabs lighter crabs always males you can tell in the mail by the pointed apron on the bottom they don't have the red red tips on their claws this is a decent size probably would be a medium-sized crab probably five and three-quarters or so size across the top of the shell but because it's light it's going to be sold as a lake crab [Music] sometimes on the boat we get what we call super trash which is basically just a paper shell so that's where the top and the sides the whole crab is kind of squishy so those crabs are basically worthless for anything they're too hard to sell as a soft crab they're too soft to sell as a horror crab or a light so the shell's got to be at least fairly firm in order to sell as a light if not the shell just kind of when you steam it it kind of deteriorates and falls apart doesn't really hold together to where you can actually eat it it's just too soft those crabs all get thrown overboard that's what we call super trash some people call them four crabs or paper shells or you know a few different names for them but those are what you would typically throw overboard they're not good for anything they wouldn't be kept at all you should know that if i'm throwing them over they must not be any good all right i like the lights uh they're easier to pick i'll show you when we steam them up the meat pulls right out of them you can pick through them real quick if you want to make uh crab cakes or something getting lights is a great easy way to pick the meat out quick good for kids you're gonna spend all this money on crabs they're just gonna pick through them and waste half of it whatever else the lights are good for kids to eat and uh people that don't eat crabs often it's cheaper crab because it hasn't filled in yet it's not a good full crab those crabs are always cheaper than the good heavy crabs so good way to initiate people into the process of eating crabs and you just want to taste it you want to spend a ton of money i always sell my lights a lot cheaper than the horror crabs i like for people to be able to eat crabs if you ain't got a lot of money or you want to have a bunch of people or whatever you get a couple bushels it's not going to break the bank but you can still have a traditional maryland crab feast and not cost you a bunch of money and put you out i'll show you the trick that i use to make the lights taste a little bit better we put them in a cooler and then let them sit for a while season them up good and that seasoning with that juice inside of them it kind of draws that seasoning in and really seasons the meat up good really makes gives them a really good taste makes them taste really good i like my crabs hot or cold i don't like them lukewarm when they're lukewarm they're not as good when they're nice and hot or they're cold right out of the refrigerator they just have a better taste to me once they cool once they cool off they're kind of i don't know they lose a little bit for storing them if you got you put them in the cord and they stay hot longer so take a couple out eat them that way you dump them out on the table they start to all get cold before helps insulate keeps them warm and make sure you always got good good hot crabs to eat some people just leave them in the steam pot take what they need and the steamer will keep them warm but if you steam your crabs somewhere different than where you're eating them if you're if you're steaming them in your garage and then you eat them on the deck you can take the core to the deck you don't have steam pot and all that or whatever but you can also leave them in a steam pocket that's another little trick to keep them warm until you're ready to serve them it doesn't seem like you can really overcook crabs i mean obviously you left them in there for a real long time you can under cook them that that happens often meat gets mushy and sometimes it's still watery you never want to eat a mushy crab it's either rotten or it's undercooked leaving them in the pie too long or it doesn't seem to ever be an issue over steaming them you always want to steam them longer than not enough the one thing you really got to watch is boiling all the water at the bottom of your pot if you pull the water out of your pot that will ruin your crabs every single time when all the liquid cooks off you're basically burning the bottom of the pot and that that burnt flavor goes all through the crabs more than one bushel and nice crabs has been ruined by boiling the water out so you got to keep an eye on your make sure you put enough water in the bottom of your pot so that you don't do that keep your lids sealed on tight so that it doesn't all all the steam doesn't seep out on top i had a little piece of crabs here i wanted to go through bronco and his family are going to take a bunch home they're going to have a great feast tonight we're going to i'm going to pick through these males these are all lights here so we got about three quarters of a bushel here we'll probably see most of it whatever will fit the pot there's gonna be some happy people tonight [Music] here marilyn we steam our crabs that's just what we do gotta have some way to keep the crabs out of the water so i use the stainless steel contraption this actually has little legs on it but it doesn't keep them up high enough so i put this in then i put my grade in that helps keep the crabs up out of the water and just the steam boils from when they do them in the crab houses the carryouts they use dry steam so they have a boiler that blows steam in there's no water at all you're not boiling water you're blowing dry steam in that um gives you a really good product and that's what vast majority of places use when you get them when you order them from somewhere this old pot here is a world war ii cook pot my neighbor gave it to me us stamped on the side i'm pretty sure it's it's aluminum and then i got this stainless steel lid that goes on the top makes a nice nice tight fit you don't have something with a real tight lid you want to get some newspaper or something and put it around there and keep it tight keep that steam in there because if you're losing a lot of steam you're going to boil all your water out so this this is a good tight lid now what we use to steam the crabs that's some people use water some people add a beer and water minus a slug or two put your beer in there some people use apple cider vinegar some people use white vinegar we're gonna use it all just so we cover all the bases and i don't have to get comments like oh you didn't use apple cider vinegar it ain't gonna taste right we're gonna use them all i guess i'll get complaints as we use it all oh well i don't care i got the feeling a little apple cider vinegar about that much little little bit splash a little some a little whey vinegar i like the white vinegar because i think it keeps the foam down some of that juice starts to come out of them they start bubbling out it can get in the water it makes the water bubble up real bad and i don't like the water bubbling up so i i think that vinegar helps with that some people add a little seasoning in there too kind of season that water you get so much of it falling in there i don't ever add any wood any seasoning and then your water you want to have a good good amount of water in there so that it uh it isn't going to bubble up or boil the crabs it's going to just make a good steam and steam them but you always want to have a little more liquid than you need because you do not want to pull that water out of there if you boil that water out of there your crabs are going to get thrown in the trash they will be no good all right first and foremost you want that water boiling before you put the crabs in there if you do not let that water boil it's going to take an hour and a half get the water boiling it's about 35 minutes 40 minutes at the most to steam the crabs make some good and completely cooked all the way through no issues with them we're gonna fire this steamer up just got a propane bottle make sure you got enough gas to get through through the cooking process this particular steamer has uh one of these here safety regulators on it of course we're going to bypass that like i always say safety third got us a zip tie to hold that down can't zip tie it it ain't worth fixing this one also has a timer on an automatic shutoff timer [Music] after 15 minutes which is more like 12 it shuts the burner off so if you're not paying attention you don't come out here and keep turning a knob you got crabs that shut off and then then they're cold i mean it's a mess so we use this here clamp to put on there and then that bypasses the the timer so we won't have to worry about it shutting off for the low pressure or whatever switch and the timer switch we can open up the gas and lettery i like to get the flame good and high really cooking getting that water really boiling and then throw the crabs in there let it let it cook really good for 10 or 15 minutes and then maybe turn it down some just so it's more like a rolling boil easiest way i found to light these yep because with good matches which i don't have get your match going lay that in there turn your gas on that way you don't burn your fingers i guess you could have one in grill starters get her turned up good and hot [Laughter] put your lid on and then wait for it to come to a real good roll and boil and then we'll put them crabs in there always want to wait until that water's boiling good you can see that steam starting to come out i didn't put the lid on super tight that's how you want it it's it's a rolling boil really boiling good it's not coming up over the top of the strainer so you're not boiling them crabs you're you're just steaming them we're going to throw these crabs in there we're going to season a layer go crabs in there season layer throw crabs in season layer and then slam the lid on there we're going to cook them for about 40 minutes this is quite a few crabs here we're going to do so we want to get them good and cooked all right the seasoning we've already been through this i do not use obey obey does not have flake salt in it it does not have that good crab house crab taste you might use obey i don't think it tastes good that's my personal opinion i'm not saying you're wrong i'm just telling you how i do it i got a mixture here this is j.o and harbor and might even have some old original y river still residual in there who knows we're going to give them a good shake season them up good and we're going to add another layer i'm going a little easy on the seasoning just because the kids are going to eat them and i don't want to get them too hot we'll make sure they enjoy them if they were mine i'd be seasoning them heavy that's how i like want them nice number two crabs see that see that steam still coming through them good we're gonna hit them good oh it smells good but can you smell it we're going to slam that lid home we're going to set the timer 40 minutes check them look through them a little bit make sure break a leg off pass the meat we'll turn this burner off still see it's got a little bit of steam coming off open it up [Music] let some of that steam out man that smells good you don't want to use the gloves you put the live crabs in with to pick your steam crabs you want to use something else because all the germs and that bacteria and all that's on them crabs will get on your your crabs to eat whoa so we'll pull a few out check down here in the middle when you cook a big batch like this sometimes the outside can get good and cooked but down there in the middle where the steam didn't get all into sometimes you'll have some little rawer ones you don't want that gotta make sure they get all the way all the way good and steamed i like to try to get down in there a little ways and get one of them crabs take and set a claw aside let it cool off a little bit and we'll bust it open and make sure it's good and cooked through good [Music] that's awesome don't get much better than that take a little newspaper set it in your core [Music] just helps keep it a little cleaner and we'll take them crabs [Music] we're dropping in there shuffle it on there and especially them them lights the steam and the seasoning and that kind of that water that's in them will all kind of mix together and that seasoning will really suck inside of them and that's a really good trick for them lights put them in a cooler let them sit for another half hour so let that sink let them marinade kind of in that season and then pull them out and eat them they'll still be nice and warm gotta make sure you set the table for a crab feast grab yourself old bomber sun or capital paper or whatever you got laying around here we got these light crabs these are uh easy picking open them up meat comes out you break down claws pull the meat out of them it's a lot easier to eat here's my favorite part right here pull all that backfin out get that big long even these little side legs you can eat them easy meat comes right out of them now these crabs definitely you know they're not it's not full so there's not not quite as much meat as a nice heavy pool crab but they're just so easy to eat a lot less time consuming to pick through and these if you let them sit a little bit in that core that juice kind of sucks in in that seasoning and really really gives them a great flavor because the crab hasn't filled all the meat back in and shed a couple weeks ago and still got some room to fill the meat in because it grew its shell that's why that water will get in there and fill in those voids where the where the meat isn't man are they good you can see they're a little bit juicier that juice has such a good flavor to it you can break them legs loose meat comes out if you're paying big money for crabs and you're opening them up or watery that's a light crab you shouldn't be paying more than 25 30 at the very most a dozen for lights a lot of times they're a dollar dollar fifty you know fifteen twenty bucks a dozen for crabs and in maryland that's they're cheap even the smalls right now are twenty five to thirty five dollars a dozen for small heavy good heavy small even if it's a nice big crab i've got things all watery shouldn't be like that just my opinion in maryland it's all about how heavy the crabs are so if they're good and packed really full full crabs that's what you're paying the big money for if you know they're late you know you know what you're getting like in the instance where you're paying good money then you shouldn't be getting lucky we squeeze all our crabs all the lights get put into separate baths get the hard crabs go in another basket and we get paid differently i saw most of my lights out of the house because i can get some more money for my buyer doesn't want the lights so if you've never tried the lights cheap crabs summer crabs and picking crabs trash crabs give them a try put them in a core for a half hour let them sit marinate them juices and that seasoning all together i promise you you will not regret it good way to save a few dollars on the lights

Channel: FV Miss Paula

Views: 40,633

Keywords: how to steam blue crabs The Lights, steamed crabs, steaming crabs, crab steam, maryland crab, maryland crab feast, seafood, seafood recipes, recipe, how to, how to steam crabs, crabs, blue crab, crabbing, crabbing in maryland, steamed maryland crabs, fishermen, fisherman, watermen, waterman, fishing vessel, deadliest catch, commercial seafood, seafood industry, crustacean, delicious, delicacy, shellfish, shell fish, tricks, hack, cooking tips, delicious trick, delicious food, cuisine

Id: wmfixFvF73Q

Length: 22min 25sec (1345 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 20 2021