On this page: Shrimp and Crab Cakes, Dipping Sauce, and Gruyere Cheese Puffs
Shrimp and Crab Cakes ^top
I love the taste of the cilantro with the red onion and garlic in these little crab and shrimp cakes. The cilantro in this recipe turns the shrimp cakes slightly green. If you make this recipe with all crab, add a little bit of pureed shrimp in to the batter as a binder rather than the usual breadcrumbs.
Ingredients
½ pounds shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 pound lump crabmeat
1 clove garlic, peeled and minced
½ small red onion, diced
3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 tablespoon Asian fish sauce (nam pla)
1 cup Japanese-style Panko bread crumbs
¼ cup peanut oil
Instructions
Combine the shrimp, garlic, onion, cilantro, and fish sauce in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Purée the mixture for 2 minutes. Add in the crabmeat. Transfer the mixture to a medium bowl and cover with plastic. Refrigerate for about 1 hour or until the mixture is chilled and firm. Line a baking sheet with plastic wrap. Dip your hands into cold water. Shape the shrimp mixture into approximately 15 small patties and place them onto the baking sheet. Wash your hands and dry them well. Coat each patty with some of the Panko bread crumbs. Heat the oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add just enough fish cakes to the pan so they aren’t crowded. Sauté the shrimp cakes for about 3 minutes. Carefully turn the shrimp cakes over with a spatula, and cook on the other side for an additional 3 minutes. Remove the shrimp cakes and drain them on paper toweling. Serve with our Asian-style dipping sauce. Makes about 15 cakes. Note – I usually like to buy Alaskan king crab (shown above). I use the shells for stock. King crab shells are nice and clean and easy to work with versus other varieties of crab shells.
Dipping Sauce for our Crab and Shrimp Cakes ^top
This sauce is a tasty accompaniment to our shrimp cakes and it is excellent with our egg rolls as well. When I lived in Thailand as a young girl, every week we went to a Thai restaurant that served shrimp cakes and dipping sauce similar to this. Those flavors still haunt me and I’ve tried to replicate the recipe.
Ingredients
5 tablespoons fresh lime juice
¼ cup water
2 tablespoons Asian fish sauce (nam pla)
2 tablespoons sugar
¼ cup minced cucumber
2 teaspoons Asian chili-garlic sauce
Instructions
In a medium bowl, whisk the lime juice, water, fish sauce, sugar, cucumber, and chili-garlic sauce to combine. Makes about 1 cup. Nam Pla is a salty, fermented fish sauce with an extremely pungent odor. It’s used as a condiment, sauce and seasoning ingredient. Nam pla is popular throughout Southeast Asia and is known as nuoc nam in Vietnam and as shottsuru in Japan. Ancient Romans used a nam pla counterpart called garum.
Gruyere Cheese Puffs ^top
Every evening in the bar at the lodge we serve these little puffs. Guests love them with a glass of wine. This is a recipe with a past - a very old fashioned bread puff flavored with Swiss cheese officially called gougère in France. Gougère are made from flour and butter paste called pate a choux which translates to “cabbage paste”. The pastry for the pate a choux (also known as cream puff paste) is one type of dough worth learning how to make. From the basic dough you can bake desserts such as cream puffs, éclairs and other delicious sweets. The addition of grated cheese (and/or herbs, spices, or bits of smoked salmon) transforms the dough into savory gougère. Gougère have hollow insides, perfect just as is for a light and refreshing bite – or to be stuffed with delicious fillings such as wild mushrooms and onions or smoked salmon cardamom spread. Once baked, gougère are best eaten fresh, but after cooling them you can store them in airtight containers in the freezer up to 10 days. To serve, reheat the cheese puffs directly from the freezer in a 325 degree oven for about 10 minutes or until they are hot. To make these little puffs, first preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and spray 2 baking sheet pans with nonstick spray.
Ingredients
6 tablespoons butter
1 cup chicken stock
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup of bread flour
¼ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
4 eggs
¾ cup grated Gruyere cheese
Freshly ground pepper
1 Tablespoon of minced chives
Instructions
In a heavy bottomed saucepan, combine 6 Tablespoons butter, 1 cup of chicken stock, and ¼ teaspoon of salt and bring this mixture to a boil. Remove the pan from the heat and add 1 cup of bread flour and ¼ teaspoon of ground nutmeg. Using a sturdy wooden spoon, stir until the dough is formed and is smooth and shiny. Return the pan to the heat and stir constantly until the mixture comes away from the sides of the pan, about 2 minutes. Add in 4 eggs, one at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition. Add in ¾ cup grated Gruyere cheese, pepper to taste and about a Tablespoon of minced chives. Continue mixing until well incorporated. Drop the dough by tablespoons onto the baking sheet about 2 inches apart. Bake them for about 10 minutes or until they are golden and puffy. Makes 24 servings. You can make your gougère in different shapes, like a big ring – or pipe it from a pastry bag – or make large oversized puff pastries and fill them with sandwich fillings like dressed baby greens.
