blue manna crab cakes with a citrus salad

One of my favourite lunches at a local restaurant is the crab cakes with a grapefruit salad. Given that I had a fridge full of crab and the variety of citrus in my fruit bowl was looking tantalising, I thought I would give it a go at home. 

The crab cakes I did are based on a Jamie Oliver recipe. Jamie's recipe most likely refers to the brown crab most commonly eaten in England as it specifies a ratio of brown to white crabmeat of 2:1. In the case of blue manna crabs you will however find the majority of the meat is white. I slightly altered the original recipe based on what I had at home. 

ingredients

     -   500g potatoes, larger ones halved

     -   sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

     -   olive oil

     -   500g mixed crabmeat

     -   2 lemons

     -   a few sprigs of fresh coriander

     -   ½ a fresh red chilli, thinly sliced

     -   3 spring onions, trimmed and sliced

method

The first step is to boil the potatoes in salted water until tender, this usually takes around 20 mins. You can peel the potatoes if you like, but I prefer to leave the skin on.  Once the potatoes are cooked through, drain the water from the pot, season the potatoes and mash. Grate the zest of one of the lemons and then chop together with the red chilli, spring onions and coriander. Add all your chopped ingredients and crab meat to the pot with the potatoes and continue to mash until well combined. Once the mixture is cool enough to handle shape into round patties (makes about 12). 

Transfer the patties to the fridge one complete and let them rest (and firm up) for a minimum of 4 hours. I made the mistake of leaving out this step and although they still tasted great they didn't hold together very well! When you are ready to eat, heat a frying pan over high heat, add olive oil and the patties in batches and cook for about 5 mins, or until cooked through, turning half way. 

The citrus salad is a Martha Stewart recipe which again underwent a few forced modifications for what was available in the pantry (becoming a much simpler salad) as I had very little desire to rush down to the shops on a Sunday evening.

ingredients

     -   ruby-red or pink grapefruit, peel and pith removed

     -   blood oranges, peel and pith removed

     -   3 tablespoons sherry vinegar

     -   1 tablespoon honey

     -   Salt and freshly ground black pepper

     -   5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

     -   1/4 cup canola oil

     -   cos lettuce

method

Using a short sharp knife peel the oranges and grapefruit, ensuring that you have removed all the pith. Once peeled segment the fruit by slice on either side of the membrane and removing each segment. Performing this over a bowl to catch all the juices, and squeeze the leftover fruit to remove all the juice once the segments have been removed. 

To make the vinaigrette combine the honey, vinegar salt and pepper. Slowly whisk in the olive oil and then the canola oil and some of the reserved juices to taste. To serve; arrange the citrus segments over the lettuce and drizzle with vinaigrette. 

Serve the salad with hot crab cakes straight from the pan...