Skip to main content
Main

Crabs in Shells

Crabs in Shells is a dish of boiled crab meat mixed with onion, ginger, lime, mushroom ketchup, and seasonings, baked in crab shells.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Ginger and lime match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,621 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Crabs in Shells

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the crab

  1. Clean and boil the crabs, then pick out the meat and set the crab shells aside.

  2. Chop the meat and mix it with the onion, ginger, lime juice, mushroom ketchup, salt, and pepper.

Make the filling

  1. Heat butter in a frying pan, add the mixture, and cook until the butter is absorbed.

  2. Pour in a little stock and boil until nearly evaporated, then remove from heat.

Fill and bake

  1. Butter five crab shells and fill them with the mixture.

  2. Grind the crab shells, mix them with breadcrumbs, and sprinkle over the filled shells.

  3. Top with small lumps of butter, place in the oven, and bake for a few minutes.

  4. Serve very hot.

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. Ginger + limetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,621 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Lime + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,491 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Ginger + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  5. Onion + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,595 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Crab meat
Forms the main body of the filling, giving it its flavour and substance.
Butter
Carries flavour and adds richness, browning the topping in the oven.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust over the filled shells when baked.
Lime juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich crab flavour.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the filling as it cooks.

The step that matters

Boil the stock until nearly evaporated. Reducing the stock concentrates flavour and removes excess liquid, so the filling stays moist but not watery and holds together in the shells.

Swap the lime

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crab, onion, ginger, mushroom, ketchup, pepper, butter):

  1. Lemonfits about as well
  2. Limethe original
  3. Avocadofits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against crab, onion, ginger, mushroom, ketchup, pepper, butter. 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.

You might also like

Mushroom SoupMushroom Soup60 recipesCrab SoupCrab Soup39 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes