Dungeness Crab Stuffed Bell Peppers

Good Monday morning Foodies, and Happy November! I hope everyone had a great Halloween...I know I did!
It was chilly over the weekend (Shocker, Shocker) so I decided that Sunday would be the day to stay home and cook. This week's recipe: Dungeness Crab Stuffed Bell Peppers.
Honestly folks...this is one of the best crab recipes I have ever enjoyed. The stuffing stayed a bit crisp, the peppers were not overcooked and bursting with flavor and the sweet mild Dungeness crab meat melded so well with the fresh Mozzarella & Parmesan cheeses.
That crab stuffing was to die for. I must find new uses for it, and try it with Lobster. In my experience anything that is awesome with crab, will be even more so with a nice Maine or Tristan Lobster Tail. More on that experiment later!
Also, this weekend was the first time I got to test drive my new Nikon :)
Gone are the days of slightly blurry photography clipped from the Flip camera. My Flip is outstanding when it comes to video, but for still photography, it was time to move on up!
So here are the recipe and video for the Dungeness Crab Stuffed Bell Peppers. Good photography coming soon!

Dungeness Crab Stuffed Bell Peppers
Ingredients
1/2 cup Panko breadcrumbs
The meat of 1 11/2 -2lb Dungeness Crab
1 stalk celery, chopped
1/2 dry minced onion
4 bell peppers
1 garlic clove, minced
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup shredded fresh mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese

Directions
Sauté vegetables, excluding bell peppers, in clarified butter until tender (about 5 minutes). Mix in the Crab Meat and bread crumbs. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Stuff bell peppers and cover tops with cheese. Bake 350°F for 30 minutes covered with tinfoil. Remove tinfoil after 30 minutes and continue to bake for another 10 minutes uncovered until cheese becomes brown on top.
Serve immediately.

Oven Roasted Dungeness Crab with Orange Dipping Sauce

Good Wednesday morning foodies. It's a slow start for me today, I can't seem to wake up! Last night I made Oven Roasted Dungeness crabs with orange dipping sauce. I made just the legs of the Dungeness this way, and the body meat I threw into an Alfredo sauce that went into the freezer for dinner some other night. Yay for planning ahead!
My camera man/ Sous Chef/boy was cool enough to use the awesome new pasta press to make home made noodles to have with the crab. I would have liked to serve it over a green salad or something like that, but he was DIEING to try it out and hand made pasta is always friggen awesome. I won't turn down home made pasta/help because I'm not insane...(no comments from the peanut gallery on that one please)thankfully everything turned out excellent.
We both enjoyed the orange dipping sauce so much I went back to the stove and made a bowl of it to bring to the dinner table. What we had drizzled on the crab was never going to be enough. I even used the reduction to dip my bread into. I wish I would have had enough of it to freeze some for later use. That would be an awesome marinade for a lot of different seafood dishes.
Enough of my rambling...I do that when I'm tired.
Here is the video and the recipe for last night's seafood adventure! Later today, I'll be downstairs in front of the Lobster Gram warehouse preparing our NEW Angus Steak Burgers, our Giant 7-8 oz Bratwurst and Giant 7-8 oz Hot dogs for the office. It's another one of our famous BBQ days and that's always a blast. I'll definitely have some great pictures to share with you all from that! Happy Eating foodies!


Ingredients
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1/4 cup olive oil (Use Orange)
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced shallot
1 1/2 teaspoons dried crushed red pepper
|2 large Dungeness crabs, cooked, cleaned, and cracked (about 4 1/4 pounds)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme, divided
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley, divided
1/2 cup blood orange juice or regular orange juice
1 teaspoon finely grated blood orange peel or regular orange peel

Directions
Preheat oven to 500°F. Melt butter with oil in heavy large ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Stir in garlic and green onion. Add crabs. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon chopped thyme and 1 tablespoon chopped parsley over crabs. Stir to combine.
Place crab legs in oven dish and pour melted butter mixture over crab. Roast crabs until heated through, stirring once, about 12 minutes. When Crabs are roasted, pour crab drippings from roasting dish back into the skillet you used before and add orange juice and peel to same skillet; Add the other tbs of Thyme and Parsley. Boil until sauce is reduced by about half and serve drizzled over crab and along side it for dipping.

Crab Hominy Chowder

This is an amazing Crab chowder! It's best to use Dungeness Crab for this one!

Ingredients

• 3 slices bacon
  
• 1 large leek
  
• 1/2 cup dry white wine
  
• 2 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth
  
• 1 cup hominy, drained and rinsed
  
• 12 ounces red thin-skinned potatoes
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 1 avocado
  
• 1 teaspoon lime juice
  
• 1/4 cup whipping cream
  
• 8 ounces Dungeness crab, cooked and shelled
  
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
  
• 1/4 cup olive oil
  
• 1 cup cilantro, chopped
  
• 2 fresh jalapeno chilies
  
• 1 clove garlic

Directions
In a 4- to 6-quart pan over medium-high heat, cook bacon, chopped, until fat starts to render. Discard all but 1 teaspoon fat from pan. Add white part of leek, halved, rinsed, and thinly sliced; stir until limp. Add wine and boil until almost evaporated. Add chicken broth; 2 cups water; hominy; potatoes, scrubbed and cut into 1/2-inch chunks; and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until potatoes are tender when pierced, about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, make cilantro puree (see below). Also pit, peel, and chop avocado; mix with lime juice. Stir whipping cream and salt and pepper to taste into chowder. Add Dungeness crab; cover and cook until heated through, stirring as little as possible to keep crab intact. Spoon chowder into bowls and top each with a tablespoon of cilantro puree and a spoonful of avocado. To make the cilantro puree, in a blender, combine vegetable oil; olive oil; cilantro; chilies, rinsed, stemmed, and seeded; garlic, peeled; and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Whirl until smooth. Any leftovers can be spread on toast for an easy appetizer.
Source:Hominy

Seafood Cioppino

This fantastic recipe brings together some of my favorite seafoods. The Dungeness Crabs that are used in this recipe, can easily be replaced with live Maine lobsters. To make this recipe even easier, consider using pre-cooked Jonah crab meat, or pre cooked lobster meat.

Ingredients

• 2 onions, diced
  
• 6 garlic cloves, chopped
  
• 1 green bell pepper, chopped
  
• 1/4 cup olive oil
  
• 2 cups dry red wine
  
• 2 cups clam juice
  
• 1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes
  
• 1 (8-ounce) can tomato sauce
  
• 1 bay leaf
  
• 1 tablespoon sugar
  
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano
  
• 1 tablespoon dried basil
  
• 1 tablespoon ground black pepper
  
• 1 tablespoon dried crushed red pepper
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
  
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  
• 3 whole-cooked Dungeness crabs
  
• 1 pound little neck clams, scrubbed
  
• 1 pound large shrimp
  
• 3 pounds firm white fish, cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces
  
• 2 loaves sourdough bread
  
• Garnish: chopped fresh parsley

Directions
Saute first 3 ingredients in hot oil in a large stock pot until tender; stir in next 13 ingredients (wine through lemon juice). Bring to a boil; cover, reduce heat, and simmer 1 hour. Let cool; cover and chill at least 12 hours. Pry off apron or tail flap from crabs. Lift off top shell, saving cream-colored "crab butter" from inside the top shell, and discard shell. Pull out and discard feathery gills adhering to the body meat. Discard stomach mass, and break crab into left and right sections. Twist legs and claws from body. Cut each body section crosswise into 2 pieces. Crack legs with a wooden mallet. Set body pieces, cracked claws, and "crab butter" aside. Discard any raw clams that are open. Warm chilled tomato mixture in a large saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until thoroughly heated. Place crab, clams, shrimp, and fish in a large stock pot. Pour the warm tomato broth over seafood; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, simmer 10 to 12 minutes. Discard any clams that did not open during cooking. Serve with sourdough bread; garnish, if desired.
Source:Cioppino

Dungeness Crab Pot

This crab recipe is so elegant and easy to prepare. Most of my recipes can use any type of crab you like best, but this one needs to be prepared with dungeness crabs.

Ingredients

• 1 can (14 oz.) reduced-sodium chicken broth
  
• 3/4 cup dry vermouth
  
• 2 tablespoons butter or margarine (optional)
  
• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley
  
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
  
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
  
• 2 cooked Dungeness crabs (about 3 lb. total), cleaned and cracked

Directions
In a 6-8 quart covered pan over high heat, bring chicken broth, vermouth, butter, parsley, soy sauce, lemon juice, and garlic to a boil. Add crab pieces. Cover and simmer over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, just until crab is hot, about 4 minutes. Spoon crab pieces into wide bowls; ladle broth over crab.
Source:Crabby Pot