Black Pepper Crab

 

Black Pepper Crab - a dish I have not eaten anywhere else but Singapore until now. I always thought it was a very complicated dish to prepare and stayed away for a very long time. Thanks to these lockdowns I was getting these urges and memories of those yummy dishes I garnered strength to try it out. It turns out that it's not super complicated to prepare. They say it can be prepared using any type of crab but to get the real impact it has to be a mud crab. Thankfully the seafood shop nearby had this and they also cut and cleaned it for me as well. Which otherwise is a story by itself. 

Ingredients

1. Mud crab - 1 for 2 people (I got 2) cut in quarters
2. Black Pepper - 50 gms
3. Garlic - 1 whole garlic (minced)
4. Ginger - 1 inch (grated)
5. Red onion - 1 (thinly sliced)
6. Butter - 50 gms
7. Chicken stock - 1 cup
8. Oyster sauce - 3-4 table spoons
9. Kecap Manis (Sweet soya sauce) - 3-4 table spoons
10. Dark Soya sauce - 1-2 table spoons
11. Sugar - 1 tea spoon
12. Corn flour - 2 tea spoons
13. Curry leaves - a handful

Method

1. Crush the black pepper into a coarse powder (not smooth)
2. Dry roast the crushed pepper in a wok for about 10-15 seconds (until you can smell the pepper).  Preferably use the same wok you will use for further steps and keep aside.
3. Deep fry the crab pieces until they turn red using any vegetable oil and set aside.
4. Transfer the oil and whatever remains to a container.
5. Melt the butter and add the minced garlic, ginger and onions and saute them for about a minute.
6. Add the chicken stock, oyster sauce, kecap manis, dark soya sauce, sugar and the crushed pepper.
7. Keep stirring until this mixture comes to a boil.
8. Add the curry leaves and toss it up.
9. Add the corn flour mixed in water and stir for a few minutes until the sauce thickens.
10. Add the deep fried crabs and saute for about 2 to 3 minutes.

Serve hot as an entre.

Singapore Chilli Crab

Hello,

Am back again after a short break. This is one of those dishes that I cooked without tasting ever. I still haven't brought myself to buy a dish that costs $85. Yes, that is what it costs at Sambal for their signature dish. It was on my "To Cook" for a while and it happened over the long weekend. Thanks to the Queen.

What goes in:

• Crab
• Onion, Ginger, Garlic paste
• Chilli powder (can replace this with Thai red chilli added to the paste above)
• Tomato paste
• Sambal paste
• Palm sugar (or normal sugar would do as well)
• Vinegar
• Soy sauce
• Tomato Sauce

Crab Cleaning

The very first time we attempted to cook crab was in Phoenix and it was a major disaster. So did a little more research this time.

1) If the crabs are still alive you should give a tap on its head just near the eyes to "knock them off". The one we had was already dead. 

2) Take a nice big knife and split the crab right in the middle.

3) Once split, you can easily open up the top shell and clean all the slimy stuff out. You can run it under cold water. There will also be some gray fibery substance on the top - get that out as well.

4) Chop up the claws or sections as some people call it.

Now to the curry

1. Heat up a wide sauce pan and pour a few tablespoons of oil.
2. Saute the onion-ginger-garlic paste until the oil separates a bit.
3. Add the tomato paste and the sambal paste and saute it for a few minutes.
4. Add vinegar, tomato sauce, soy sauce and palm sugar and saute until the sugar is dissolved completely.
5. Toss in the crab and saute for about 10 minutes. The crab shells will turn red by then.

The result:

One needs to have a taste for seafood and the fishy smell else don't bother to try this. :-)

Happy Cooking

C