I’m constantly looking at new recipes. I keep a list of all the ones I hope to one day cook, and some recipes, I get to in a couple days or weeks. But some recipes linger on the list for months or even years. Recipes that I added even though they seemed complicated, recipes that I keep skipping over because they feel outside my skill range, some even that I’ve tried and failed in the past. My most satisfying cooking moments are always when I manage to successfully tackle one of those recipes (like my char siu bao). This crab and avocado salad has been sitting on my recipes list for three years. Serving a whole avocado, crusted with spices and stuffed with crab salad, seemed beyond my grasp, the technique of getting the crab inside the avocado too confusing, the variety of spices for crusting too extravagant. But recently, I found myself with crab and avocado in my grocery cart, and I knew I had to make this. It all fell together as I put my own twist on the recipe, adding in Asian flavors with soy sauce, sesame oil, and masago, using my own variety of seeds and spices, and just having fun making it. Afterwards, cutting into my creation, I felt an amazing sense of accomplishment. Another recipe conquered.
Crab and Avocado Salad (adapted from Luxirare)
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients:
- 8 ounces lump crab meat*
- 1/4 red onion diced
- 1 bunch cilantro, chopped
- 1/4 cup golden raisins
- juice of 2 limes
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce**
- 1 Tbsp sesame oil
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 2 Tbsp toasted shelled pumpkin seeds
- 1 Tbsp black peppercorns
- 1 Tbsp fried red onions***
- 1 Tbsp black sesame seeds
- 1/2 Tbsp crushed red pepper
- 1 Tbsp tobiko or masago****
- 4 avocados*****
*Substituting with fake crab meat is fine.
**If you can’t eat gluten, make sure you’re using a gluten-free soy sauce.
***I picked these up at an Asian market, but as the only ingredients are red onion and palm oil, I imagine you can easily make your own by frying red onions in palm oil until crisp, then cooling.
****These are the bright orange fish roe you may be familiar with from sushi – tobiko (flying fish roe) is slightly larger (and more expensive) than masago (capelin roe), but they are very similar in taste and texture. You should be able to find them at an Asian market, but you’ll also be fine without them.
*****If you’re just mixing diced avocado into the salad, you only need 2, but if you plan on stuffing and crusting avocados to serve, you will need 4.
Method:
- In a large bowl, combine 8 ounces lump crab meat, 1/4 red onion diced, 1 bunch cilantro, chopped, and 1/4 cup golden raisins.
- In a small bowl, whisk together juice of 2 limes, 1 Tbsp soy sauce, 1 Tbsp sesame oil, and 1 clove garlic, minced, then pour over the crab mixture, and toss thoroughly to combine. Taste, and add more of any dressing ingredient, if needed.
- In a spice grinder or mortar and pestle
, combine 2 Tbsp toasted shelled pumpkin seeds, 1 Tbsp black peppercorns, 1 Tbsp fried red onions, 1 Tbsp black sesame seeds, and 1/2 Tbsp crushed red pepper, and grind coarsely.
- Stir 1 Tbsp tobiko or masago into the spice mixture, then set aside.
- Carefully slice 4 avocados in half vertically, and remove the pit.
- Spread out a piece of plastic wrap. Scoop out the flesh of both halves of an avocado, leaving a 1/2″ shell of avocado flesh still attached to the skin, then mash it and spread it in a thick layer on the plastic wrap.
- Pile about 1/4 of the crab salad (or as much as you think will fit inside your avocado) in the center of the layer of avocado.
- Place the plastic wrap into one of the scooped out halves, crab side up (I know, I know, there’s plastic wrap inbetween the shell of avocado and the inside avocado and crab, we’ll get to that). Pull the sides of the plastic wrap up to pull the crab salad together surrounded by the mashed avocado layer.
- Pull down the sides of the plastic wrap, and clamp the other half of the avocado in place. You should have the plastic wrap sticking out all around the seam of the halves. While holding the avocado halves together, slowly pull out the plastic wrap from one side; the avocado and crab should all remain inside the whole avocado.
- Carefully peel the skin off the avocado.
- Spread the spice mixture in a plate or shallow bowl, then carefully roll the avocado in it to crust with the spices. Set the spice-crusted avocado on a plate and serve.
- Alternatively, you can simply dice 2 avocados, and mix the diced avocado, along with the spices (probably only need about 1/2, and you don’t have to grind them), into the crab salad, then scoop into the avocado skin or a bowl to serve.
