No preamble here, just the recommendation that you get a whole cooked crab and remove the white meat yourself. It will take some patience and require tools but worth the effort.
Serves 2
Ingredients:
- Whole cooked crab, white meat only
- 3 large avocados
- 20 cherry tomatoes
- 3 spring onions, chopped
- 1 red onion, half chopped, half finely chopped
- 1 cucumber
- 1 bunch coriander, leaves only, torn
- 2 x limes, juiced
- 4 red chillies, deseeded and finely chopped
- 2 tsp. hot chilli powder
- good pinch of salt
- extra virgin olive oil
for the mayonnaise:
- 2 eggs, yolks only, at room temp
- 2 tsp. Dijon mustard
- 1 tbsp. lemon juice
- 150ml extra virgin olive oil or rapeseed oil
- good pinch of salt
- small pinch of pepper
Instructions:
- This salad is constructed in 3 sections: use a cooking ring, or freestyle into a tower, but before you start, make the mayo – I use a small countertop blender with a blade for this
- Into the bowl of your blender add the egg yolks, Dijon mustard, lemon juice, salt and pepper and give it a quick whizz
- Then, keeping the speed of the blade high, introduce the oil very, very slowly: extra virgin olive oil definitely leaves its impression on this mayo, so use rapeseed if you prefer something more neutral
- Keeping the oil at a fine pour, the mayo should emulsify in a matter of minutes: you only need a couple of tablespoons, but the rest will keep in a jar, refrigerated, for a week
- For the base of the salad, peel the cucumber, cut in half and then quarter lengthways, deseed and cube
- Chop 14 of the cherry toms into quarters and, along with the half of chopped red onion, combine in a bowl with the cucumber, dress with small amount of olive oil and some salt – if you are not using a tower, divide this mix between two plates
- For the next section, halve the avocados, squeeze out of their skin into a bowl and roughly chop
- Add the lime, the remaining finely chopped red onion, chopped spring onions, the remaining cherry toms (also quartered), finely chopped chillies, most of the torn coriander leaves and a good pinch of salt
- You want to give this a good mix, with a fork, so it resembles a coarse guacamole
- Using this as your next layer, divide between the two plates straight onto the first layer and roughly shape into a disk, incorporating some of the first section into it
- For the final section, you want to combine two tablespoons of the mayonnaise with the white crab meat and chilli powder
- Spoon this onto the avocado layer, sprinkle over the last of the coriander and serve with some tabasco
FU2020 