coastal cuisine

Get a little crabby

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Tyrone Walker/The Post and Courier

The ingredients for authentic she-crab soup will contain the orange roe, or eggs, from a female blue crab along with the meat.

Buffalo's got wings, Baltimore's got crab cakes and Philadelphia's got cheese steaks.

Here in the Lowcountry, we've got she-crab soup :

along with Frogmore stew, shrimp pilau, benne wafers and shrimp and grits, but those are a different story.

You get right down to the core of Lowcountry cooking, and you'll find a steamy, creamy bowl of she-crab soup.

Charleston claims this recipe developed by the late William Deas. He was a butler for the Rhetts, a noted Charleston family, and later worked in a restaurant, Everett's. The story goes that when President William Howard Taft visited the Rhetts, Deas dressed up the president's crab soup with some crab eggs, or roe, thus inventing she-crab soup.

The delicious orange roe from the she-crab adds a unique flavor and texture, but South Carolina discourages its citizens from catching female crabs with roe. Apparently, laws are looser elsewhere, so frozen roe is available at some seafood stores. You may use a couple of crumbled, hard-cooked chicken egg yolks in place of the roe.

Also, although sherry was used by Deas, Madeira was the fortified wine of choice in the Lowcountry from the 1700s to Prohibition.

She-Crab Soup

Serves 6

• 2 tablespoons butter

• 1 green onion, finely chopped

• 1 stalk celery, finely chopped

• 2 tablespoons flour

• 1 quart milk

• 2 cups heavy cream

• She-crab, cooked and picked over to make 3 cups of lump crabmeat and eggs (roe)

• 2 hard-cooked eggs (optional)

• Salt

• White pepper

• Dash hot sauce

• 1/3 cup sherry or Madeira

• 1/2 cup heavy cream, whipped (optional)

• Paprika

Melt the butter in a heavy saucepan, add the onion and celery, and cook until the onion is soft but not browned. Stir in the flour, then add the milk and cream and bring to a boil, stirring constantly and watching that it does not boil over or burn on the bottom. Remove from the heat and add the crab meat with the roe (or crumbled egg yolks). Taste, season with salt, white pepper and hot sauce. To serve, place a small amount of sherry or Madeira in each soup bowl, and add the soup. Top with whipped cream if desired and sprinkle with paprika.

Source: The Post and Courier