Clay's Kitchen : Crab Recipes

Crab Recipes

Crabmeat and Shrimp Au Gratin

Recipe from: Mrs. Kitching's Smith Island Cookbook

Seventy-five miles southeast of Washington, DC in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay, accessible only by boat, is tiny Smith Island, where a 300-year-old culture has survived in singular isolation. For a quarter of a century in this unique setting, Frances Kitching has been operating a small but acclaimed restaurant and inn. Susan Stiles Dowell, working closely with her has gathered more than one hundred of her recipes - many of them family recipes handed down in the oral tradition from mother to daughter for generations.

½ pound Smith Island deluxe crab meat
2 pounds shrimp, steamed, shelled, and deveined
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon prepared mustard
1 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoons dry sherry
1 teaspoon onion flakes
1 teaspoon parsley flakes
salt and pepper to taste
1 cup medium sharp cheese, grated

Melt butter over low flame. Add flour to form a paste. Slowly stir in milk to make white sauce. Combine remaining ingredients, except cheese, shrimp, and crab meat, and add to white sauce. Fold in shrimp and crab meat. Pour into a casserole dish, top with cheese and bake at 350°F for 25 minutes.

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