Wednesday, November 16, 2011

I got crabs from being on the internet

I got some of the best crabs ever last night and ate them in the comfort of my own home.

I thought I would try the mysteriously-labeled “Fish Grill Crab” from Fish Grill through 6alabat.com.  It made no mention of how many I would get or how it would be cooked, but the picture appeared to have whole crabs, so I went for it.
(Photo credit:  Fish Grill on 6alabat.com)

I love crabs, but I am somewhat reserved about cooking them in Kuwait as I’ve always heard that you never never eat crabs that you purchase dead.  Like lobster, crab should always be alive and then steamed (or boiled or whatever).  Cooking crab is kinda messy too (now that I’m getting lazier in life).  AND, although some of my friends tell me they have bought Old Bay in Kuwait, I haven’t seen it anywhere.

So anyhoo, I ordered the crabs from Fish Grill and Oh. My. God….

YUMMMM

I got a tray that contained about a half dozen (I didn’t count, unfortunately, because I was hungry and tearing through the buggers).  Fish Grill cooks them in a barbecue-style sauce with shredded onion and peppers.  The sauce is really really good- kind of sweet-Asian.  The crabs come seemingly intact, although on closer inspection, you can see that they have been neatly re-arranged after the lungs (bad parts) have been extracted.  I guess this could be so that the sauce permeates into the meat; however, I like the “mustard” and wished they had left it in.

I set about eating them with table manners to that of a Tasmanian devil.

Southern Bedu looked at me with a look of shock and dismay (dare I say "disgust"?)

‘Whaaaa?  I’m in my own place.  I can do this.  Go get me some pliers.’

“Pliers?!  Why do you need them???”  (Shockfaced again).

‘Because I want to smash their legs of course!’

Dude gets me the pliers (NO!  Not the SMALL ones!) and sits back down to eat his shrimp while staring at me the entire time as if it is the first time he’s really seeing me.  He finally just says to me, “You know, if I wanted to eat one of those things, I would need a user’s manual…”

It made me laugh (but not put down the sauce-covered crustacean in my hand). 

So, with the help (not much, actually) of Desert Dawg (she loves crabs too), we devoured the entire tray.

I don’t know if Southern Bedu has a trash phobia, but he had whisked the shells up to the curb before I had a chance to wash my hands.  (Or could it be, perhaps, that he just didn’t like the looks of the things and didn’t want them hangin around?)  He’s actually quite good with trash and if he doesn’t have any other chore (well, okay, to be truthful, he does; even if he doesn’t always know it), he’s got taking out the trash well covered. 

I know it isn’t because he wants to feed the neighborhood stray cats with seafood leftovers either.  He’s got a theory that cats harbor bad spirits and he always shouts something that sounds like, “chim chim” at them.  There’s some religious significance to it supposedly but I’m not buying it…

Just like trying to kill all the gecko lizards on my terrace.  There’s some religious significance to that too, but I’m not having it.  I love my lizards and both the geckos and the cats bring me endless hours of joy with the laser pointer.  Why you wanna squash (literally) my fun?

… how did I digress from crabs??? 

Oh, ok…  Anyways, for the paltry sum of 5kd, you can have crabs delivered to your house through 6alabat.com from Fish Grill and they rock.  5kd is kinda shteep if you consider that crabs sell for around 750 fils ($2.73) at the fresh fish market, but you don’t have to cook them, so whatever.

Anyhoo, Southern Bedu’s response was priceless.



(Eating crabs capped off a very very good day. Plus it was maid-day.   I got an invite from the owner of The Boudoir Salon to stop by and check them out.  I did and it was amaaaaaaaaaaaazing and I’m going to write about that in a separate post.)

4 comments:

Natalia said...

Hi I´ve just droped by ypur blog. And I agree with you, If you are going to buy crab to cook at home this should be alive, if it is dead you wont know when did it die but in Q8 is quite difficult or impossible to by this alive, at least I love shellfish and never seen any alive.
I am spanish and have my blog, as I am very lazy when I have to translate my post in to english I just make a summary of what I´ve writen. I invite you to read it, hope you dont get bored.
www.diariodeunsidecar.blogspot.com

Meggo said...

Thanks so much! I keep wanting to order from there.... growing up on the west coast I love seafood (especially crab!), but was hesitant to try it here.... After payday, I think I"ll treat myself! :)

Expat and the City said...

Hahahahaha, this post is so funny! You know I'm too lazy to pick out crab meat myself but it sounds delicious.

The Fish Market has Mud Crabs (alive) from time to time and they will cook it for you. They have take out but will not deliver. Happy Thanksgiving DG! :*

Anonymous said...

LOL @ Bedu and the garbage. Most of my Kuwaiti friends won't even cook fish in the house, only in the outside kitchen or on the outside grill. They HATE the smell of any seafood - or, I think any food - hanging around in the house. Out go all the remnants as soon as the meal is over.

That crab sounds fantastic.