Featured on Tastemade: Vietnamese Stir Fried Salt & Pepper Dungeness Crab- Vietnamese “Cua Rang Muoi” Recipe
See reel -here-.
Don’t boil crabs next time, stir fry them. One of my favorite Vietnamese ways to eat crab especially Dungeness crabs is stir fried with a savory, slightly sweet and peppery oyster sauce!
This is our family’s favorite way to eat Dungeness crab!
First we brine the crabs in a simple salt water solution to maximize flavor and moistness. Then we stir fry them in a finger licking salt & pepper, oyster sauce.
Stir fried crabs with salt aka “cua rang muoi”, is one of the tastiest and most visually appealing seafood dishes. It’s also one of the most popular dishes in Vietnam because it’s oh so finger licking good!
These crabs are bigger so they have plenty of meat in the body and legs unlike smaller crab varieties like blue crab.
I also like to use wild caught dungeness crab from Pacific Northwest (Washington and Oregon Coast). If you can’t find them near you, get them online, here.
Typically this dish requires deep frying the crab and then stir frying it with sauce but my dad’s recipe is simpler and it also utilizes the crabs’ mustard sauce for that extra savory kick to the sauce.
For my other traditional method click below:
Tips:
-Soaking the crab sections in cold salt water will help it retain it’s tenderness and moistness when stir frying.
-Keeping the crabs’ “mustard” will flavor the sauce with a rich seafood umami flavor so don’t throw this out!
-Ever wonder why you can’t by fresh raw crabs & how to humanely kill a crab:
Spiking is one of the most humane ways to kill a crab, it is done by using an awl or a sharp-pointed knife to quickly severe the central nervous system of a crab.
There is also a secondary step which you can also freeze the crab some before spiking to minimize the chance of any more due stress onto the crab.
Unfortunately the only safe way to fresh raw crabs is to buy them live otherwise you’re always stuck with pre-cooked and likely frozen crab at the store (dead raw crab meat turns mushy and builds up bacteria quick so it’s never sold uncooked unless you buy live).
Spiking is one of the most humane ways to kill a crab, it is done by using an awl or a sharp-pointed knife to quickly severe the central nervous system of a crab.
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INGREDIENTS
2 Dungeness live crabs (Pacific Dream Seafood 2 lbs Dungeness crabs)
Brine:
6 cups cold water
2 tbs sea salt or kosher salt
Stir fry:
4-6 smashed garlic cloves
1/4 cup cooking oil (I used Youyou Tea seed oil but you can use canola, or vegetable oil)
+ crab sauce below
Crab sauce:
1 1/2 tsp black pepper
1 1/2 tsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp msg (optional)
2 tsp white vinegar
2 tbs oyster sauce
1-2 tsp fish sauce
2 tsp sesame oil
2 tbs minced garlic
+ “mustard” from the 2 dungeness crabs
Garnish:
1 handful of cilantro (optional)
1 handful of chopped scallions or chives
Few lime wedges
Optional jalapeño or thai chili pepper slices for heat
Optional Lime dipping sauce , aka “Nuoc Cham”:
1 lemon or lime wedge (or 1 tbs fresh squeezed lemon or lime juice)
1/4 teaspoon salt (sea salt or kosher salt, not table salt)
1/2 teaspoon black pepper (or black & white pepper, or rainbow peppercorns, freshly ground)
PREPARATION
Put it in the freezer for about 15 minutes to numb crabs, making it much more humane before handling them. Spike crab to humanely kill crab, turn the crab over to have its shell facing down, then lift the abdominal flap (tail flap) and insert a spike (an awl or sharp-pointed knife) all the way through the rear nerve centre, this will quickly and humanely kill the crab by severing both nerve centers.
Use a brush to clean off crab under cold water.
Flip the crab over and tip off the triangular flap, the “apron”, on its underside and discard the flap/apron.
Remove the top hard shell from the body. Using one hand you want to gather up the claws on one side of the body, then use your other hand to pull the shell away from the gathered up claws.
Use a spoon to scrape the yellow crab “mustard” & tomalley from the shell. Then place it into a small bowl and set aside. Don’t throw this away, it contains all the yummy umami crab flavor and we will use it to make it’s sauce! If you are absolutely disgusted about this part, you can skip this step but I would advise against it.
Discard the spongy gills from the center of the body sections. Then cut the crab in half lengthwise to separate one side of legs from the other side, then cut those sections in half to split up the leg sections into nice portions.
Tap & crack the knuckles and claws so that they are easy to eat and so that the marinade can penetrate to the meat.
Place crab sections into a bowl with the cold brine (cold water and salt) and let soak in fridge for 45 min.
While your crab is brining, make your sauce by combining all the sauce ingredients. Add fish sauce in last to taste (about 1-2 tsp is plenty). If you are afraid of fish sauce or don’t have it on hand simply, skip it or replace with light soy sauce.
After 45 min is up. Drain crab in colander and set aside. Heat up oil in a pan and add smashed garlic cloves (just use the side of your knife and smash down on garlic cloves to flatten them) after oil is hot and shimmery.
Once garlic is nicely browned and oil is fragrant, remove the garlic pieces. Leave about 1 tbs of oil in the pan (reserve the rest of the oil in a small heat proof cup or bowl) and cook the crab mustard with about 1/2 tsp of salt. Let simmer for about a minute or two and remove and place in a bowl.
Add back in remaining oil and heat on med-high until oil is hot. Then add your crab sections back in and cook with a lid on until crab claws and legs are orange in collar and meat in the body sections are cooked through. In last minute of cooking, add half your scallions, and optional: jalepeno, cilantro and chili peppers. Toss, and then plate immediately.
Plate crab on a nice rounded plate. Pour remaining sauce over crab sections, and garnish with some remaining scallions, and optional: jalepeno, cilantro and chili peppers.
Eat plain with a side of rice, or with the optional nuoc cham dipping sauce above! And eat up the remaining sauce with rice, it’s the best part for me at the end!