Crab Hush Puppies
Whenever we visit our friend Cameron on the Eastern Shore, two things are certain:
We'll fish our asses off.
There will be hush puppies at some point.
And when Cameron says the fishing is on fire, we head out there with haste. We met up with two other friends at Cameron’s recently and had ourselves a classic Eastern Shore fish camp, hush puppies included.
We baited and dropped a few crab pots off the dock and along the channel, and then proceeded to fish from sunrise to sunset. Rachel outfished me by a long shot the first day, and she landed the biggest puppy drum out of the five of us fishing, but I did eventually manage to find some fish on the second day. We checked the crab pots on our way back to the dock every evening, and they were never teeming, but we pulled enough heavy crabs to steam a batch, pick them and add them to the fish camp staple: the hush puppies.
We set up a small fryer on the screened in deck and fried some speckled trout, red drum and the crab hush puppies, while we took turns recounting the fish we caught, the lures we used and the pros and cons of various leaders and leader knots. It was a great weekend with even better people.
This hushpuppy recipe can be made without crab meat, but if you have crab meat and don’t put it in hushpuppies what are you even doing with your life? Also, this recipe calls for a ½ pound of crab meat as a starting point- as with most things that involve crab meat, use as much as you want, but you can’t really put too much in there. Another note, the lebnah (or sour cream) in the recipe is needed to activate the baking powder. If you want to omit it, you can sub out the lebnah and milk and use buttermilk instead.
Cook these in batches in a few inches of hot oil, 350-375F, rotating the hush puppies as needed to get them evenly brown. It should take about 3 minutes of total cooking time. Also, let them cool for a few minutes before biting into them. They will be molten hot, and the rest time allows the center to finish cooking. Getting into them too fast will result in burnt mouths and gooey batter.
Crab Hush Puppies Recipe
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 10 minutes
Serves: 4-6
Ingredients:
¾ cup flour
¾ cup cornmeal
1 tbsp sugar
1 ½ tsp baking powder
2 tsp salt
½ tsp paprika
½ tsp ground black pepper
- - -
1 egg
½ cup labneh (sub sour cream)
½ cup milk
- - -
2 tbsp jalapeno, small dice
¼ cup onion, small dice
¼ cup butter, cold, small dice
2+ cup crab meat (~½ pound, use as much as 1 pound)
Method
Preheat frying oil to 350-375F.
Mix all dry ingredients. Add in egg, labneh and milk, stir to combine. Add in the remaining ingredients and fold lightly to distribute. Add a dash of water if the batter is too dry. It should be thin enough where it won’t hold its shape when scooped with a spoon, but thick enough that it will go into the fryer as one clump.
Using two spoons or a small portion scoop, drop tablespoon sized dollops of batter into the hot oil. Don’t overcrowd the oil. Cook for about 3 minutes, until golden brown on all sides. Rotate as needed to evenly cook. Fight the urge to put in larger scoops- the outside will be overcooked by the time the inside is done.
Use a slotted spoon to remove hushpuppies from the oil, and allow to drain and cool on a wire rack or paper towel lined plate. Allow oil to come back up to temp before starting another batch.
Serve with your favorite sauces. I personally like to keep it simple with some butter and a little hot sauce.
