The Ultimate Crab Cakes, Remoulade, & Toasted Peasant Bread
- Ready In:
- 1hr 10mins
- Ingredients:
- 31
- Serves:
-
6-8
ingredients
-
CRAB CAKES
- 2 lbs russet potatoes, cut into 1-inch cubes
- 1 cup whole milk
- 2 garlic cloves, smashed
- 1⁄4 bunch fresh thyme sprig
- 2 bay leaves
- 1⁄2 teaspoon whole black peppercorn
- 1 lb fresh lump crabmeat
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 pinch red pepper flakes
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1⁄2 bunch chives, finely chopped
- 3 cups fresh breadcrumbs
- 5 tablespoons vegetable oil, for frying
- lemon slice, for garnish
- mixed salad green, with
- vinaigrette, as accompaniment
- toasted peasant bread, as accompaniment
-
REMOULADE
- 2 cups mayonnaise
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- 2 tablespoons cornichons (We left them out, personal preference, optional) (optional) or 2 tablespoons sour gherkins, minced (We left them out, personal preference) (optional)
- 3 tablespoons capers, minced
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves
- 1 tablespoon chopped tarragon leaf
- 1 1⁄2 anchovies, minced
- 1 dash hot pepper sauce, to taste
-
TOASTED PEASANT BREAD
- 1 loaf peasant bread, sliced into 1/2-inch pieces (Boboli was what we used)
- extra virgin olive oil
- 4 garlic cloves, halved
- freshly grated parmesan cheese
- chopped fresh parsley, leaves
directions
-
MAKE REMOULDAE FIRST:
- Mix all ingredients together in a bowl.
- Refrigerate for 30 minutes before serving.
-
CRAB CAKES:
- Put potatoes in a large pot and cover with cold water.
- Add salt and bring to a boil, uncovered.
- Simmer for 20 minutes until there is no resistance when a fork is inserted.
- Drain the potatoes and make sure they are dry.
- Mash them in a large bowl until there are no lumps.
- While the potatoes are cooking, heat the milk, garlic, thyme, bay leaves, peppercorns, and 1 tablespoon of butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat.
- Do not let boil.
- Using a sieve, strain the milk and herbs into the potatoes and mix thoroughly.
- Add the chopped chives and season with salt & a pinch of crushed red pepper flakes.
- Check crabmeat for pieces of shell.
- Cover with plastic wrap and leave in the refrigerator until ready to use.
- Remove and carefully fold into the potatoes.
- Using your hands shape the mixture into medium sized patties, taking care to flatten out the centers and smooth out the top.
- Roll them in bread crumbs and shake off excess.
- Coat a large non-stick skillet with 1/4" of oil over a medium heat until it begins to smoke slightly.
- Pan-fry the crab cakes until brown, about 5 minutes on each side, turning carefully with a spatula.
- Remove from pan and serve on a large flat dish with Remoulade.
- Garnish with slices of lemon, & serve with a mixed green salad, & freshly prepared toasted peasant bread(recipe to follow).
-
TOASTED PEASANT BREAD:
- Preheat the oven to 500ºF.
- Put a sheet pan in the oven so that it gets good and hot.
- Place the bread slices on the hot sheet pan.
- Drizzle the bread with extra-virgin olive oil bake for 5 minutes, until the bread is nicely toasted.
- Rub the bread slices with the garlic cloves, and discard garlic.
- Sprinkle with freshly grated parmesan and parsley and serve.
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RECIPE SUBMITTED BY
<p>Hello all, thank you for visiting My Page but forgive me for it is a work in progress! :) As I am sure you have noticed I changed my Chef Name to Manami which means love & beauty. ;) Just thought I should get with the program - my geisha & my icon! :) Don't fret, I won't change it again! <br /><br />I am 70 years young and I live in a nursing home, which is out of this world, I am treated like a princess and the world is my oyster! I have a private room and during the season I do taxes for most of the staff, as well as my personal clients that have been following me since I left the business world about 25 years ago. I was rear-ended by a van and it turned my whole world upside down. Why dwell on that? <br /><br />I am an American Jew (from NYC) who moved to Havana, Cuba when I was 2 1/2 years old, lived there until a few days after Castro took over and vamoosed it out of that country as fast as my legs would carry me! I was on a forced hiatus from the UofM, due to illness. <br /><br />From there my sister, mother and I went to NYC to work and my father went to Haiti in Port-Au-Prince, where he and my uncle had purchased some tiny cocoa plantations & a chocolate factory - for the choccolate liquer - to make baking chocolate (the real bitter stuff). We joined my father about 2 months later where I spent 2 of the most carefree & wonderful years of my life! It is the stuff that movies are made of! (A la Grace Kelly - even my clothes were like hers)> </p>
<p>I then continued my studies in upstate NY and hated it because it was too, too cold!:( Went back to NYC to work and see what I wanted to do with my life - I was all of 20 years old and had to drop out of school because of illness and then because of the weather! Yuck - so I got a job in a Textile Buying Office as a receptionist and soon I found myself buying trimmings! Loved it and was very happy with the work I was doing. <br /><br />However, I got an offer from two young guys who had a factory in Cleveland, Ohio, where they made Maternity Clothes and they wanted me to be in charge of the shipping dept, keep inventory and in my spare time - help with the designing!! I couldn't pass it up - the offer sounded so great and the salary was twice what I was making in the NYC. So I went to Cleveland, got married, had both my children and got a divorce 15 years later. <br /><br />Then my children and I moved to South Florida and have been here since 1978, I can't count that far back :) <br /><br />Learned how to do taxes with H&R Block and worked simultaneously as a Supervisor in 2 offices for them for 15 years. Then after the accident everything went spiralling downwards until I could no longer walk alone even with a walker - so the next step was a wheelchair. Stayed at home with a lot of help (nurses, PT therapists) fixed the bathroom so I could bathe myself and fixed the kitchen so I could help warm-up meals (was taught how to cook in rehab) and so forth and so on. <br /><br />However, the fire department had other plans for me, I called them too often to pick me up off the floor - how embarassing! So they gave me a choice - either a home or they would have to call HRS! :( (very sad) <br /><br />It was there, in my home where I was robbed! <img title=Cry src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-cry.gif border=0 alt=Cry /> All my cookbooks (all my Julia Childs Cookbooks, my Settlement Cookbook which had been my mothers - published in 1939 - with all her notes) my mother's cookbooks from Cuba & Haiti, all my handwritten recipes. They also took all my Delft collection, some antiques that I had in the kitchen like my rolling pin, a beautiful old & used wooden bowl, a charcoal-iron that was brought north when my parents left Haiti, it was hand-painted & was gorgeous, as well as all the other things that are too numerous to mention! <br /><br />That proved to be the last straw & from there it was an ALF,<img title=Yell src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-yell.gif border=0 alt=Yell /> which was horrible, and then on to another home where the administrator of that home became the administrator here and voila, here I am. <img title=Smile src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-smile.gif border=0 alt=Smile /></p>
<p>I have a beautiful large private room with a private bath, furnished to my liking: eclectic! <img title=Wink src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-wink.gif border=0 alt=Wink /> My room is large enough to house my office and all the other odds and ends with which I like to surround myself.<br /><br />During tax season, mostly, my room is always full (of course I love it that way)! I have a blanket my daughter bought for me in New Mexico and that is on my bed. You guessed it - that is where everbody sits or on my great grandfather's arm chair which is in great shape. <img title=Smile src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-smile.gif border=0 alt=Smile /> Update 01/11/2008 that time is here again :) Have started doing taxes already and not just regular taxes but corporations, partnerships and 1040X - ammended returns! Whoopee! I love the feeling I get when this time comes around and I get into gear!!! I love it! :) <br /><br />The head chef, the kitchen supervisor & the dietician enjoy the recipes from Zaar; the ones that I post, as well as, the others. We are in the process of changing the menu right now - so we have been doing a lot of figuring. The administrator is so cute because every once in a while she asks for a recipe and then she gives me a pack of paper so I can print them. <img title=Wink src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-wink.gif border=0 alt=Wink /><br /><br />I am president of the resident council and most of the family members come to me to take care of their grievances - this way I do my part - and the staff can take care of the larger problems! It has been working for 10 years - why change if it ain't broke?<img title=Wink src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-wink.gif border=0 alt=Wink /></p>
<p>Well, it's time to say hasta luego folks. <img title=Laughing src=/tiny_mce/plugins/emotions/img/smiley-laughing.gif border=0 alt=Laughing /><br /><br /></p>