So one night I decided to imitate The Boiling Crab’s (The Whole Sha-bang). If you don’t know what The Boiling Crab is, it’s restaurant chain we have in California (originally from Texas) that specializes in a delicious cajun/garlic/butter/lemony sauce that they drench seafood in, topped off with a great hands-on, finger-licking experience (see The Boiling Crab).
Anyway, just a warning. This blog post is going to be long! A lot of thought went into my attempt to make Boiling Crab. I watched a few videos and looked at a few recipes online (links at the bottom) and just kinda took what was common from most of them. I hope I help save you time from comparing online recipes with my one blog post!
By the way, It turned out pretty delicious! A little too spicy for my taste but it satisfied my craving without standing in line forever and I even had leftovers. It didn’t take that much longer than cooking a typical dinner. Alone it took about 1-1.5hrs (even shorter if you cook with a partner!) So if you want to try for yourself, keep reading 🙂
Ingredients
Keep in mind this is what I used for 2.5lbs of seafood.
- 2.5lbs seafood medley from Costco (shrimp, mussels, calamari, scallops)
- 1 ear of corn
- 1 cup (2 sticks) of butter
- 1 lemon
- 5 cloves of garlic
- 2 tablespoons paprika
- 2 tablespoons lemon pepper
- 2 tablespoons cajun seasoning
- 2 tablespoons cayenne pepper
- 2 tablespoons Old Bay Seasoning
- Cooked rice
What we didn’t end up using in our recipe but was suggested on online sources:
- Crawfish, Shrimp, & Crab Boil in a Bag
- Louisiana Hot Sauce
- Other seafoods (e.g. crawfish, crab) or meats (i.e. sausage)
Directions
1. Rinse seafood and drain. Repeat a few times. On the side, rinse rice and put it in a rice cooker.
2. Cut the lemon into halves. Boil the seafood in hot water with a lemon half for about 3 mins and put to the side.
3. While rinsing and boiling the seafood, in a large saucepan, melt the 2 sticks of butter on low. On the side, peel and chop the cloves of garlic and add it to the butter when you can.
4. Take equal parts of each seasoning and mix it together. I did 2 tablespoons of each but I would advise that you start with 1 tablespoon of each first. Add it to the melted butter and garlic and see how you like the taste. Then decide to add more seasoning if desired. The number of garlic cloves you use can probably vary too, depending on your taste.
4. Mix in the seafood and let it simmer in the sauce for a few minutes and it’s done! You can use the leftover unused lemon to squeeze onto the seafood after if you like.
What I Would’ve Done Differently
- Boil seafood with lemon. I actually didn’t remember to do this til the very end so I’ll try to remember next time.
- Start out with 1 tablespoon of seasoning and increase from there. I actually started out with 2 tablespoons but it was a little too spicy and a little too much seasoning than I’d like.
- Have a bigger strainer and boiling pot on hand. It took a few rounds of rinsing and boiling with a small strainer and medium boiling pot.
- DO NOT touch the Crab Boil in a Bag (or any other seasoning) and then touch your nose or face. It burned so much…
- Use better seafood!
Thanks for reading and hope you try out this simple recipe when you have a Boiling Crab craving! It’s not the real thing, but it’s close enough. Also, special thanks to all the links I used to help me cook:
AMANDAMLIM 