Recipes: Pincer movement

The old adage is that shellfish shouldn't be eaten in a month without an "r" in it. But in these days of refrigeration that need not apply. Crab is my favourite and, like all shellfish, very filling. If you plan it for a first course, don't be too generous in the amount you give each person otherwise they will have no room left for the following courses.

Crab is best served as simply as possible. For me, this is cold, with a good mayonnaise, or a salsa, dressed mixed leaf salad and soda or a seeded bread.

When I go south, I find crab from Cornwall on menus in London and it is very good. But it isn't nearly as good as our Skye crab, which spoils you for any other.

I find people are unnecessarily fussy about the crab they eat, in that too often they request no brown crabmeat, only the white, flaky meat. Yet the flavour is intense in the brown meat – it lacks the appealing appearance of the white, but my ideal is half and half. One thing you must remember though is that crab needs salt.

I have a recipe for a crab soup which is a real contender to better any lobster bisque. The recipe for crab tart with Parmesan and pink peppercorn pastry is a winner too.Crab Soup

For this you really do need the shells from the crab. A good fishmonger will supply you with shells as well as the picked brown and white crabmeats.

SERVES 6

1 large crab, its flesh removed and kept in a covered bowl in the fridge until you are ready to use it
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 onion, skinned and chopped
1 bulb of fennel, trimmed at its base, and chopped
1 leek, trimmed and sliced
1 carrot, trimmed at either end, peeled and chopped
1/4 pint/140ml dry white wine
2 pints/1.2l stock – I use vegetable stock usually, but fish stock if you have some. Marigold stock powder made up with boiling water does well

For the soup:

2 tablespoons olive oil
6 good tomatoes, washed, quartered and seeds removed
3 cloves of garlic, skinned and chopped
1 sprig of thyme about 2in/5cm in length
2 teaspoons tomato purée
2 potatoes, peeled and chopped quite small
1 teaspoon salt, about 20 grinds of black pepper
a dash of Tabasco

Heat the first two tablespoons of olive oil in a large saucepan and fry the chopped onion, chopped fennel, sliced leek and chopped carrot. Stir occasionally, and let the vegetables cook for about five minutes. Then add the crab shells to the contents of the pan, pour in the white wine, and let it almost evaporate. Pour in the stock, and half cover the pan with its lid. Simmer the contents for half an hour, then cool and strain into a bowl or measuring jug, pressing down into the sieve, to get as much from the contents in the liquid as possible.

To make the soup, heat the olive oil in a clean saucepan and add the de-seeded tomato quarters, the chopped garlic, the chopped potatoes and the thyme sprig. Stir and cook for a couple of minutes. Stir in the tomato purée and the strained liquid from the crabshells. Simmer, the pan uncovered, for 15 minutes or until when you squish a bit of potato against the side of the pan it feels soft. Add the brown crabmeat to the soup, cook for a minute, then draw the pan off the heat, remove the sprig of thyme, and liquidise the contents of the saucepan. Season with salt and pepper, and a dash of tabasco, and stir the white crabmeat through the soup. Taste, and add more salt or pepper if you think it is needed. Re-heat to serve.

CRAB TART WITH PARMESAN AND PINK PEPPERCORN PASTRY

SERVES 6

For the pastry:

4oz/110g butter, hard from the fridge and cut into several pieces
6oz/170g flour
2 teaspoons icing sugar
2oz/55g grated Parmesan cheese
3 teaspoons dried pink peppercorns

Put the pieces of hard butter, flour, icing sugar and grated Parmesan cheese into a food processor and whiz to the texture of fine crumbs. Then add the dried pink peppercorns and whiz briefly, just to break them up and mix them into the pastry crumbs. Press this firmly around the sides and over the base of a flan dish measuring about 9in/22cm diameter. Put the dish into the fridge for at least an hour, then put the dish into a moderately hot oven, 180C/350F/Gas Mark 4, for 15-20 minutes. The sides will slip towards the base. Using a metal spoon, scrape and press them back up the sides and bake for a further couple of minutes. The pastry should look light biscuit in colour. Cool.

For the filling:

1lb/450g crabmeat, half and half white and brown meats
2 large eggs and 2 egg yolks
1/2 pint/285ml single cream
a dash of Tabasco, 1 teaspoon salt, about 20 grinds of black pepper

Beat together the eggs, yolks and cream, and mix in the Tabasco, salt and pepper. Mix this together with the crabmeat, mixing thoroughly. Pour this into the cooled pastry case, smooth even and bake at the same moderate heat until the centre of the tart barely wobbles when you gently shake the flan dish, about 20-25 minutes.

Serve the tart warm, with a mixed leaf salad.

KINLOCH CRAB CAKES

SERVES 4 AS A MAIN COURSE OR 6 AS A STARTER

1lb/450g crabmeat, half and half white and brown meats
3 slices of brown bread, whizzed to crumbs in a food processor with
2oz/55g parsley
2 teaspoons English mustard
1 tablespoon Worcester sauce
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
For the coating:
1 egg, beaten on a plate
2oz/55g fine breadcrumbs mixed with
1oz/28g sesame seeds

Line a tray with a sheet of baking parchment. In a bowl, mix together the crabmeats with the breadcrumbs, mustard, Worcester sauce and mayonnaise – there is no need for salt and pepper. Mix thoroughly. Form the mixture into cakes, either 4 large ones, or 6 smaller ones. Put the cakes onto the paper-lined tray and chill them.

Heat sunflower or olive oil in a non-stick sauté pan – to a depth of about 1/2 cm. Dip each cake in beaten egg then press them into the crumb and sesame seed mixture, on either side. When the oil is hot in the pan, carefully put the coated crabcakes in, and do not be tempted to move them at all for a minute, until you are ready to turn them over. I use a non-stick spatula for this, or a fish slice does perfectly, too. Cook them for a good minute on their other side, until the crumb coating is golden brown, then lift them onto a warm dish with a couple of thicknesses of kitchen paper, to absorb excess oil. Serve as soon as possible. They are good with a tomato salad and a mixed leaf one, too.