Spider Crab

There is something beautiful about a summers day; children laughing, loved up couples, the haze of smoke from BBQ s fill the air. Accompanied by the enticing smells of barbequed chicken and a light breeze, it really couldn't be a more perfect day. That is until I heard the crunch of pebbles and looked up to see a couple of fisherman pulling up their boat next to me.
Ever since I moved to Brighton I had this romanticised idea of walking down to the beach, wicker basket in hand, and choosing glorious fresh fish straight off the boat. This had never happened. So when it did my perfect day became a little more perfect. After asking if he had anything for sale her beckoned me over to a huge black tub and showed me 3 HUGE spider crabs and told me they were mine for a fiver. Bargain! I dived in, grabbing the crabs (did this very quickly in order show Mr Fisherman that I, of course, I was a dab hand at grabbing massive, untamed crabs and not crapping myself!). I then shoved them in my bag (sadly a Tesco bag for life and not the wicker basket).

I trudged my to my flat and spent the next half hour unashamedly squealing whilst trying to wrestle 'the boys' into the bottom of my fridge. Lets just say it was not a nice experience for any of us. A few hours later, and a large glass of wine for dutch courage, I peered into the fridge. With The Boy giving encouraging comments from behind I tentatively grabbed the first, and much smaller crab, and gave it a nice bath. After 15 minutes cooking and half an hour meat picking (almost to an OCD obsession) the crab was ready. Some grilled asparagus, french bread and lots of black pepper and bobs your uncle, tasty spider crab!

Grrr really annoys me that I can't rotate this!

 I might add at this point that the other two crabs were to big to fit in any of my pans so I had to get an industrial size pan from school! These were turned into a very tasty linguini that I forgot to take a photo of!

Mr Crab chillin in his industrial sized pot

Trying to escape?