Crab, Octopus, Wild King Salmon
Catch of the Day - Delicious, Sustainable Seafood
May 11, 2008 Jacqueline Church
Recipes for Crab, Octopus, Wild Alaskan King Salmon.
Each are sustainable choices, and nearly any cook can enjoy making these healthy and unique dishes. Seafood Watch guides and sites indicate the viability of these fishstocks in the wild. We can feel good about making these choices. With these tips and recipes, we can also enjoy delicious meals.
Dungeness or Stone Crab
Both Dungeness and Stone crab are sustainable choices. A recent visit to Seattle resulted in a shipment of sparkling fresh seafood shipped directly from Pure Foods at Pike Place Market. Time to try crab cakes.
Preparing Dungeness Crab Cakes
To one and half dungeness crabs cracked, picked over (squeeze water out with clean dry towel), add:
- 1/3 C each minced celery, fennel, onion
- 1 T each chopped fresh chives and parsley
Mix lightly with:
- one beaten egg
- 1/3 C mayonnaise
- 1 T Dijon mustard
- hot sauce couple of dashes
- Old Bay Seasoning ~ 1 tsp. or to taste
- salt and freshly ground black pepper
Mix gently, if it doesn't hold together loosely, add about 1 T panko to the crab mixture. Make ball the size of large meatball. Roll in panko crumbs and flatten into a cake. Fry, turning gently, about 3 minutes on each side. Use mix of butter and olive oil or clarified butter.
The good folks at Charlie's Stone Crab shared their recipe for the delicious dipping sauce which accompanies every shipment from Charlie's. Simple and delicious, it would also make a lovely dressing for some cold, poached salmon. Print and save it for next Stone Crab season or try the new fresh-frozen option.
Charlie's Horseradish-Mustard Sauce
Makes 1 cup.
Ingredients:
- 1 tablespoon Colman's dry mustard, or to taste
- 1 cup mayonnaise
- 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
- 1 teaspoon A-1 Sauce
- 1/4 cup heavy cream or milk
- fresh ground horseradish
- Salt to taste
Directions:
- Place the mustard in a small mixing bowl.
- Whisk in the mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, A-1 Sauce, cream and a pinch of salt.
- Mix until well blended and creamy.
- Chill the sauce, covered, until serving.
- Add fresh ground horseradish to taste.
May also substitute wasabi for horseradish.
May substitute sour cream low fat or regular for the mayonnaise.
Octopus Salad - Elegant Appetizer
Octopus is a good choice, especially if line-caught. They mature quickly and reproduce in good numbers. They are prized in Portugal, the Mediterranean and Japan. Many diners have had octopus while vacationing in the Mediterranean or as "tako" on a sushi menu.
For many others, the thought of cleaning and cooking an octopus or baby octopuses/octopi is so daunting, they've never attempted it at home. This recipe will demonstrate that it is no more difficult to make an elegant, delicious and healthy dish of octopus than it is to make one from chicken.
Consider that to make a chicken salad, one begins by poaching or roasting a chicken. Just so with Octopus. While cultures with a tradition of serving octopus all have their own techniques for preparing it (beat it against a rock, rub it with daikon, beat with a pan and cook only in copper); these techniques are not necessary to produce tender octopus.
For the truly geeky cooks among you, Howard McGee (AKA “The Curious Cook”) gives us the science behind the task here. Also, from the New York Times "Minimalist" Mark Bittman, we have the easy "how to" preparation.
Here are more reasons to try octopus at home:
- It's delicious.
- It's not difficult to make.
- It's inexpensive.
- It's sustainable.
Here's how easy it can be. Just as you would make chicken salad, there are essentially three steps: Poach, pick or chop, then toss with other ingredients.
Poaching Baby Octopus
- Begin with fresh (not frozen) baby octopus.
- Rinse them, slice the head from the tentacles and combine both with aromatics such as: fennel, carrot, celery, onion, peppercorns (Balinese and Sichuan work nice, both impart slightest floral notes), bay leaf and water.
- Using about six to eight baby octopus the poaching time was less than 30 minutes.
- Drain them and slide the purple skin off. This should rub off easily under cold water. Ensure that no tough parts remain in between tentacles and head. Slice the head into rings (as you would slice the body of a calamari). The tentacles should be in bite size pieces, but not too small. Now you've got perfectly tender (much more tender than sushi style, actually) pieces of poached octopus.
Toss with a citrusy vinaigrette and serve over chiffonade of romaine, placing the romaine in a martini glass and topping with the octopus. A good quality olive oil is essential to fresh preparations such as this salad. Pasolivo's Meyer Lemon Olive Oil is a good choice. Fresh herbs (parsley and oregano) fresh lemon/lime juice, Sea salt and pepper. Yuzu vinegar or juice would also work very well. A zest of fresh lemon over top. Voila!
King Salmon - Poor Fish, Happy Diner
Wild Alaskan King Salmon are caught after they are nice and fattened for their death-defying, life-ending, upstream journey to spawn. Unfortunately, the one that ends up on your plate, didn't get his, ahem, happy ending.
At least for now, the stock of this salmon is still acceptable to make it a good choice for diners. In fact, wild Alaskan salmon is a much better choice than farmed.
Cook en papillote or simply broiled. This fish has high fat content of the good, Omega oils that are so heart-healthy. The texture and flavor is so superiour to supermarket salmon you may be accustomed to, you will be surprised.
Octopus Salad
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Baby Octopi
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Octopus
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