Worth the Wait

Dungeness crab season usually starts here in mid-December.  By now we would have had two or three "crab feeds" here at the Reeder Homestead. This is a meal we look forward to all year, and we splurge to have it.

However this year the season was delayed because the crabs, a species that lives off the Pacific Coast, were not filling with meat. 

Fisheries managers use "meat-fill" tests to determine how well the Dungeness have rebounded from the late summer shedding of their shells in a process called molting. After the molt, the crabs fill with water as their shells harden and they grow new muscle. 

A two pound crab must yield a half pound of meat.

Finally the meat fill level was met. But then storms rolling in off the Pacific made the seas too rough for fishing. 

Now, finally the crabs are in! The supply is limited and the price, at $5.79 per pound today, is rather high, but that's as low as it will go this year, and our local Safeway had them in their seafood case today, so we bought two of them. 

This evening we had our long-awaited Dungeness crab feed!

Here's the menu: Spring greens with avocado, orange, and dried cranberries, cheesy parmesan bread, a little dark beer (we shared a bottle), warm lemon butter for dipping, and a whole crab each.

Eating crab is a messy business, so towels serve as napkins and newspaper covers the table. The crab is served cold, back and carapace shells and organs removed. They do that for us at the grocery store. 

That first bite, for me always a plump upper leg section, carefully removed from the shell, dipped in lemon butter, is so worth the work and the wait. 

This is a meal where you take your time, and enjoy every sweet, tender morsel.