One of my all time favorite dishes is a crab cake. I’ve tried almost every kind, fried, breaded, sautéed and I always come back to the best being just a simple basic crab cake.  The true taste of the crab is highlighted and not overpowered. They are easy to make and taste delicious.

Crab Cake ingredients: 

1 – 16oz can of crab (we used super lump)
4 to 6 tablespoons of Mayo
1 egg
1/2 cup of bread crumbs
1tsp Old Bay (use more if you like)
salt & pepper to taste

Mix the mayo, egg and spices until blended then add it to the the crab and bread crumbs.  Gently fold it all together until all the crab is coated. Don’t over knead it.  Form them into patty shaped cakes. I like to put them in the freezer for about 5 minutes before I cook them to make it easier to handle. Heat your pan (I like to use my cast iron for even heating) on medium heat, not to hot you will scorch them and they won’t cook all the way through. Add butter and sauté your crab cakes, about 2 minutes per side.

The shrimp are simple too. These literally have a 4 minute cook time total. This is one of my all time favorite ways to eat shrimp and for the chilly weather, having hot shrimp is a must.

Shrimp ingredients:

1lb of Jumbo Shrimp (16/20) – we used Publix Jumbo wild caught Pinks (I prefer true Key West pinks)
4-5 tbsp of melted butter
1/2 tsp of old bay (use more if like a more intense flavor – I did)
1/2 tsp of minced garlic (optional)

Add the spices to the melted butter.  Toss the butter mixture over the shrimp (toss them like chicken wings).  We cleaned and deveined the shrimp and patted them dry first.  My kitchen “hack” on deveining …. I use my kitchen shears to cut down the spine and then easily remove the vein. We leave the shell on to keep the shrimp moist. Get a sheet pan hot.  We put ours in the oven on broil for about 3-4 minutes.  Place the butter coated shrimp on the HOT sheet pan. Broil for 2 minutes, flip them over and broil another 2 minutes.  Done.  This is a great take on peel-n-eat shrimp.  I love adding this to a lot of our meals. It pairs well with steak, chicken or just by itself.

We blanched asparagus and added a bit of butter, salt and pepper to taste.

There are two sauces we used in this meal.  You can eat it without, but who doesn’t like sauce.  One is a basic shrimp cocktail.  You can buy store made, but we like to make our own.  Its ketchup, horseradish, a dash of Worcestershire and a squeeze of lemon. The more horseradish, the hotter it is.

The second sauce is a favorite too.  Chipotle Aioli. We cheated and didn’t make our own mayo and used store bought.  So add a tsp of Chipotle pepper to 2-3 tablespoons of mayo. stir. Viola your done.

We of course, doubled the both recipes to feed a total of 9 guests.  Another great suggestion if you have teens or children is to pair it with mac-n-cheese.  Total prep time … 30 minutes, total cook time 10 minutes. We served the crab cakes and shrimp family style – see pick below.