Dry Indian Crab Curry

A friend likened cooking crab to "adult cooking" and how true!

It has taken me 30 years of independent cooking to finally attempt crab cooked in a dry Indian curry. A key obstacle was my personal refusal to learn how to clean live crabs. It looks lethal and scares the heel out of me! So I always left the crab curry making business to Ammumma. I helped with prepping the ingredients and I usually made crab rasam from the spindly walking legs, but that's it.

So when Gogs announced he had a friend who was selling crabs, I threw in a challenge that I will cook crabs if this person did the selection, cleaning and cutting.

Long story short, challenge was accepted and here it is - Dry Crab Curry.

A few things to take note of.

1. The ingredients are akin to making chicken curry and not fish although crabs are seafood. So be sure you use the right curry powder and if you are looking for a short cut like me, then instead of making a curry paste from scratch, just use meat curry powder. My go to is Jaffna curry powder or Colombo curry powder, both of which pack a bigger punch and is actually a more general curry powder.

2. Ammumma's tip - make a crab puree. You do this by separating the walking legs from the body and giving them a grind. Keep half aside for rasam and into the balance, add some coriander powder and blitz again before straining to make a puree. This adds flavour to the curry.

3. Try to use fresh herbs like curry leaves and coriander leaves to increase the flavours.

4. It always taste better the next day.

Ingredients (4 pax)

4 mud crabs - clean and cut up

4 medium size onions

3 cm ginger

5 pips garlic

1 tsp coriander powder

3 tbsp Jaffna curry powder

1-2 tbsp chilli powder

1 tsp fenugreek

1 tsp mustard seeds

1 large tomato - chopped

1/2 cup coconut milk

2-3 stalks curry leaves

3 stalks fresh coriander leaves

1 cup water

3 tbsp gingerly oil / coconut oil

Method:

1. Make a puree out of the spindly walking legs.

2. Remove the spindly legs by giving it a twist and tug.

3. Grind it with 1-2 tbsp water.

4. Put aside half for crab rasam and the other half grind it again with the coriander powder.

5. Run it through a sieve as we only want the thick liquid which should look like a puree.

6. Set aside for later.

Grind

1. 2 onions with the ginger and garlic. Set aside.

Cooking time

1. Heat the gingerly oil and when hot put in the fenugreek and mustard seeks and let it splutter.

2. Add the ground ingredients and give it a stir before adding the remainder 2 onions (chopped)

3. Stir well till golden brown.

4. Now add the curry powder and chilli powder. Add a wee bit of water to keep the mixture from burning. Stir well to remove the rawness of the spices.

5. Add in the tomato and let cook for a bit, before you plonk in the cut crabs

6. Coat well, then add the crab puree and water.

7. Bring to a boil before adding the coconut milk.

8. Add salt and a little bit of sugar to taste.

9. You can also crush the curry leaves with your fingers and scatter it in.

10. Let this cook. Stir occasionally to ensure that it doesn't burn. Add some more water if necessary.

11. You know the crab is cooked when all the parts have turned from the original blackish colour to a reddish pink.

12. We are not making a lot of gravy, so do be careful with the water in the steps above.

13. Turn off the heat and add the chopped coriander leaves. You can also opt to add in a hand full of fried onions.
    

When the crabs turn this colour you know its cooked