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Deviled Crabs

Deviled crabs are crab meat mixed with bread crumbs, butter, mustard, salt, and cayenne pepper, baked until browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Deviled Crabs

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Drain the liquid from the can of crabs.

  2. Mix the crab meat with an equal amount of bread crumbs.

Make the filling

  1. Beat the butter until creamy, then mix in the mustard, salt, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Gently stir the crab and bread crumb mixture into the butter mixture.

Fill and bake

  1. Fill shells or small tin patty pans with the mixture.

  2. Top with a layer of bread crumbs and dot with small bits of butter.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until browned and puffed up.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Crab + buttertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together812 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Crab + mustardtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together193 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  5. Crab + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together922 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Crab meat
Provides the main body and savoury flavour of the filling.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and bind the filling, giving it a softer, set texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and browns on top for a golden finish.
Mustard
Adds a sharp, tangy flavour that cuts the richness of the butter.

The step that matters

Gently stir the crab into the butter mixture. Crab meat is delicate, so vigorous stirring breaks it into shreds and makes the filling mushy. Gentle folding keeps the lumps intact and the texture light.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crab, bread, butter, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Onionfits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against crab, bread, butter, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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