blue crab soup with sunchokes and poblano peppers

Sorry I disappeared for two week - things got a bit busy, and I was trying to polish off a few things that were "living" in the back of our fridge. In any event, I'm back! Figured I owed everyone something relatively interesting, so here's my attempt to come back with a bang.

I returned from the supermarket earlier this week with four live Atlantic blue crabs and a small bag of sunchokes. I've never actually cooked either ingredient, but I absolutely love crab, and these were very much alive and kicking as I picked them out of the bin with tongs. Hard to resist very fresh seafood. Blue crabs are relatively small (each the size of a hand), popular in Maryland, and the four cost about $4.50 total - cheaper than a couple chicken breasts!! As for the sunchokes, I've eaten them at restaurants, but never cooked them myself. They're simply the root of a flower very much resembling the sunflower. They can be cooked just like potatoes, have a similar texture, and a slightly nuttier taste. A nice change of pace.




Making the soup wasn't too tricky. I started by steaming the crabs. Next I sauteed some carrots, onions, celery, garlic in pork fat and seasoned the whole thing with old bay seasoning, salt, pepper, and a bay leaf. I crushed the crab with a meat mallet, added them to the veggies, and added a splash of sherry wine. After cooking for a couple minutes to soften the veggies, I covered the whole thing with water, brought it to a boil, and simmered everything for an hour. Once the stock had a nice flavor, I strained out the shells and added a diced potato, the sunchokes, a poblano pepper, and a couple carrots to the broth. I cooked the whole thing another 25 minutes, until the veggies were fork tender. Incidentally this is about the same amount of time it took me to get crab all over my face as I picked out the meat from the shells I strained out - think McNulty & Bunk from The Wire. The final step was to mash the potatoes, sunchokes, and carrots slightly to thicken the soup.

The "garnish" was a couple slices of garlic bread I made with a loaf of fresh homemade sourdough. De-li-cious!