Spicy Crab Soup
Do you think it is possible to become infatuated with a state simply based on one food ingredient? How about being just plain ole smitten with the state of Maryland? Oh Maryland baby you had me at Crab. Maryland Blue Crab.
From May to September there are few things more pleasurable than being on a dock somewhere off the Chesapeake Bay sat with paper lined tables piled with bright orange red crabs coarsely coated with copious amounts of spicy Old Bay Seasoning. Wooden hammers alongside provide for cracking the hard shelled specialty. All with a pitcher of icy cold beer. And “it doesn’t get better than this.”
So last week, my youngest, Alex the Athlete who now lives in Maryland was home for the weekend. Her current residence location now provides more opportunities for detoured routes for enjoying those spicy, steamed, Maryland Blue Crabs over the summer.
Did I mention steamed, Blue Crab with the classic, spicy reddish colored Old Bay Seasoning?
Spicy Crab Soup became the order of the day. What’s not to love about a soup with Maryland Blue Crab and Old Bay Seasoning? This brings me to another favorite in Maryland, Maryland Crab Soup.
Most often Maryland Crab Soup includes corn and lima beans but I didn’t include the limas in this recipe, perhaps it was sort of like holding something back for the specialty awaiting in the hot weeks ahead. Oh Maryland baby you had me at crab. Maryland Blue Crab.
Spicy Crab Soup
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 1 each green, orange, yellow pepper chopped, 1 1/2 tablespoons each color pepper set aside for topping
- 1 red long hot red pepper, seeded and finely diced
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 3 generous tablespoons Old Bay crab seasoning
- 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher salt, plus more
- 1/2 teaspoon cracked black pepper
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 lb 12ounce can diced tomatoes
- two shakes Worcestershire sauce
- few shakes Tabasco sauce
- 6 cups shrimp stock, clam juice, seafood stock, or any alternative combination, plus 1 cup to thin soup as needed at finish
- 2-3 eight ounce plastic tubs of Phillips crab claw meat, picked through of shells, one-quarter cup reserved
- 1-2 small zucchini, sliced lengthwise, sliced into strips, then cubes
- 3 1/2 cups fresh or frozen corn
Instructions
- Warm olive oil in a large soup pot, tumble in the onion and peppers and cook on very low heat for around five minutes, add in the garlic, cook another two minutes.
- Sprinkle in the Old Bay, salt, and pepper. Drop in bay leaves, stir, cook two minutes
- Topple in the tomatoes, stir, and cook around 10-12 minutes, shake in the Worcestershire and Tabasco sauce
- Pour in 6 cups shrimp stock, increase heat to medium high, heat until soup is hot, add in crab, reduce heat to very, very low and simmer for thirty minutes
- Tumble in the zucchini and corn, continue simmering soup for one and a half to two hours until soup has thickened and flavors are well incorporated, then adding a bit more stock to thin soup a bit if desired, check seasoning, adjust to taste
- Ladle soup into each bowl, garnish with some of the fresh chopped peppers and reserved crabmeat
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