Crab cakes, favas and mint/something else TBD

I am getting pretty darn psyched about tonight’s crab cake dinner. I LOVE crab cakes, could eat them pretty much every day. And yesterday, Maryland jumbo lump crabmeat was $8 off its regular price. This will be heavenly. I cannot, for the life of me, figure why anyone does anything too terribly fancy with crab. It is divine plain, in a simple cake, or atop an avocado salad. Simplicity and crabmeat like each other. Why, WHY is cream or cheese ever involved with crab? Sadness. Anyway, this leads me to a story that Shawn loves to remind me of and which was one of his prompts, years ago, for urging me towards food writing. Tom was in San Francisco for a meeting, and I, pregnant with Jack, flew out to join him for a last hurrah (as best a hurrah as one can have in a great wine area whilst pregnant). During the days, I trolled the streets of SF and one day decided to eat lunch at Jack Falstaff’s, a well-regarded, fairly popular spot near my hotel. Per my love of crabcakes as described above, I ordered said item. I was the first one in the restaurant so figured my cakes would be nice and fresh from an unhurried kitchen.

They were: a) greasy; b) completely off re the crab-filler ratio; and c) just not good at all. I called the manager over and told him that I was from the east coast where crab was abundant and the best crabcakes a simple art. He asked what I’d do differently, and I told him more crab, coat them in panko before frying, less random filler, etc. The kitchen kindly remade them but they still sucked. Sad eating experience.

So, tonight T and I will be making our most loved recipe which is mostly crab, some red onion, a bit of red pepper, lemon, some diced celery and panko. I’ll post it in a bit. I also have those fava beans that I schlepped back from NY and am thinking of making a succotash with them and some fresh corn and mint; I might also do a fava-mint puree and sit the cakes atop it.