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Canned Hard Shell Crabs

A baked crab dish with eggs, butter, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Canned Hard Shell 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 the filling

  1. Squeeze juice from the crabs and discard the juice.

  2. Boil the eggs hard, then rub the yolks to a powder and mix in the melted butter.

  3. Chop the egg whites very fine.

  4. In a bowl, combine boiling water, Worcestershire sauce, lemon juice, vinegar, and salt.

  5. Mix in the egg yolk powder and the chopped egg whites.

  6. Pick the crab meat apart.

  7. Add the crab meat to the dressing, mixing in the raw egg.

Fill and bake

  1. Wash the crab shells and fill them with the mixture.

  2. Top with a teaspoon of melted butter and fine bread crumbs.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 15 to 20 minutes, or until golden brown.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Crab + saucetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together238 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Hard shell crabs
Provides the main meat that forms the body of the filling.
Hard-boiled eggs
Yolks bound with butter form a rich, creamy base that holds the filling together.
Raw egg
Sets during baking to bind the crab meat and dressing into a cohesive filling.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the top brown in the oven.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden topping through browning in the oven.

The step that matters

Adding the raw egg to the crab mixture. Raw egg must be mixed in evenly so it sets uniformly during baking, binding the filling without leaving curdled or loose pockets.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Lemonthe original
  2. Applefits about as well
  3. Plumfits about as well
  4. Grapefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against crab, egg, butter, sauce, vinegar, bread. 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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