We've Got Crabs!!!

One of the best things about living on the water......is crabs!  We live on a small creek off the intracoastal waterway, and the crabbing is amazing!  Dennis usually has a pot off of our dock and then one or two off of the neighbor's bulkhead.  Last night he put out 3 pots and by 4 pm today we had almost two dozen crabs!

In our area EVERYONE loves to gather around a picnic table and eat crabs, and I've been eating them for years......but I've never loved them more than I do now that I've learned how Dennis does his crabs!  It's different that the way most do theirs....and it makes all the difference in the WORLD to me!

I always had extra paper towels next to me to soak up the yellow stuff.....I didn't like how it looked, what it reminded me of, nor the bitter taste it had.  But Dennis gets rid of all of that BEFORE he cooks them!

He puts them all in his sink on the dock....then he plucks them up one by one.....

.....pulls off the top shell....

....then he plucks off the lungs......

Then he uses the hose at full force to clean out the insides.....the stuff that looks gross.....and tastes as bad.......

This is usually my job....or Shelby's if she's here.  What cracks me up is how he lines them all up as they are being cleaned.....kinda like this:

He is also meticulous about how he arranges them in the pot....kinda like this:

He gets his pot of water, beer and vinegar going.....

....while he carefully layers them with Old Bay Seasoning.

Once the water/beer/vinegar starts boiling, he puts on the pot and cooks the crabs for just about 12 minutes.....almost ALWAYS they come out perfect, but I'm just not brave enough to put "always" and then yours don't turn out......umm....that's a disclaimer, I suppose. 

But I will tell you that once they're done, they're delicious.....all of that beautiful white meat.....

.....and NO yellow stuff!  Yummmmmmm............