Arachnophilia

My first wife had a fear of spiders.

No.

My first wife engaged in a fear of spiders. She played—she savored—she revelled in her fear of spiders. She swaddled herself in her fear of spiders and wore it—sported it proudly, like a uniform. Arachnophobia was a defining element of the woman's ego. She positively percolated while sharing the details of her phobia with new acquaintances—boasted of it as though it were her greatest accomplishment.

Once, while I was at work, she sat on a couch for six hours, watching a tiny dark mote on a far wall. Her eyesight was none too keen, and she had been reading, so her glasses were in another room. Had the dot moved? Just a bit? She was certain it had moved, so she couldn't get up and go to the bathroom. If she looked away the tiny potential-spider would surely scurry across the ceiling and drop into her hair. So there she sat, most of the day, staring uncertainly at Schrödinger's spider, trying to ignore her increasingly insistent bladder.

When I got home, she sat hugging a pillow, pointing a shaking forefinger at the far wall. I glanced at the offending mark and informed her that she was pointing at a nail hole. Two days before, she'd removed an ugly painting and hadn't put anything up in its place. She promptly sprinted to the bathroom.

One of the sillier aspects of this phobia was her refusal to eat crab.

I suppose I could almost understand a refusal to touch something that reminds you of a thing you find frightening, but she wouldn't even consider crab cakes, crab salad, crab soup. She would eat shrimp and lobster, but she didn't even like to sit at the same table as someone who was eating crab. She would sneer when the order was placed and shiver with disgust when it was delivered. Every time the individual took a bite of the crab, she would grimace or quietly (but audibly) ugh or ew.

I guess it comes as no surprise that I never told her about the time I had eaten barbecued tarantula. (Just the abdomen, which is remarkably firm and has a flavor similar to rock shrimp.)

I don't get it. I'm frightened by creatures that look vaguely like that food item, so I can't possibly eat it. My ex was the only person I've ever heard refuse crab based on arachnophobia. In my experience, the object of disgust is typically shrimp, crawfish, or lobsters. Almost invariably, the individual expressing displeasure uses the word bugs to encapsulate their sense of disgust.

Me? I adore crab. I love that sweetness and the marvelous range of flavors and textures among the various varieties of crab. Princess V and the Girlchild, too: crab cakes, crab newburg, Thai crab soup, grilled crab, crab chowder, crab salad, snow crab with citrus gastrique, king crab dipped in drawn butter or with Hollandaise or avocado cream.

I am a wee bit picky about crab cakes. I don't care for mushy crab cakes or bready cakes, and I despise the Maryland practice of putting corn kernels or cornmeal in crab cakes.

Here's my favorite crab cake recipe. (The one that makes Girlchild go squeee!)

Panko-dusted crab cakes on apple cole slaw with fire honey and orange-cardamom reduction

(serves three)

dramatis personae

Cakes:
one pound lump crab
three tablespoons peanut oil
one half medium red onion, minced
one garlic clove, minced or pressed
one thai pepper, minced
one tablespoon grated ginger
a dash of sea salt
one extra large egg
panko breading


Slaw:
one cup thinly sliced pak choy
one Granny Smith apple (skin on), julienned
juice of one small lemon
one tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
one half teaspoon sea salt

Fire honey:
a cup of water
a dozen chilis arbols
one tablespoon peanut oil
one quarter cup honey

Orange-cardamom reduction:
juice of five valencia oranges
one teaspoon cardamom


quality of ingredients

Lump blue crab is typically sold in closed, nearly-opaque pint tubs. This type of crabmeat is most commonly steamed and picked. Ask the fishmonger to let you see the contents of the tub and smell it. The contents should be almost entirely white and off-white, moist but not wet (definitely no pooling liquid), and should smell like something you want to eat. If it smells fishy, it has not been properly stored or handled, and you don't want it.

I chose pak choy (Napa cabbage) for the slaw because I like the fine papery texture and the sweetness, which matches well with the apple and the crab.

The granny smith should be green and crisp.

Panko is an amazing substance: breadcrumbs made by drying white bread electrostatically. The result is crunchy, dry crumbs that are not burnt or toasted in the process. Because they're so thoroughly dehydrated, panko crumbs hold their crunch. Panko comes in two varieties, white and tan—the tan variety includes the crust of the white bread. I haven't been able to discern any difference in flavor between the white and the brown.

preparation notes

Slaw

Um, you mix everything in a bowl. Duh.

Fire honey

Seed the chilis and braise them in a cup of water over over a medium flame for about five minutes. Remove the chilis and two tablespoons of the braising liquor to a blender. You can remove the chilis with a slotted spoon—I prefer a pair of chopsticks. Add a tablespoon of peanut oil and purée the concoction until the chilis are thoroughly disintegrated.

Strain the chili purée and mix it into the honey.

Taste this stuff very carefully—it's essentially honey laced with capsaicin. A little of it drizzled on the crab cakes adds a slight sweet burn, but taken straight this stuff can raise blisters. (Okay, slight exageration.)

Orange-cardamom reduction

Mix the cardamom and orange juice in a sauce pan. Over a medium flame but without boiling the juice, reduce the mixture to a syrupy consistency.

Cakes
Pick the crab for stray bits of cartilage and shell. I know. The tub said cleaned or pre-picked or something like that. Don't believe it. I have never failed to find cartilage that the processors missed. Never. If you don't pick the crab yourself, someone will get stabbed in the gums by a sliver of cartilage—not fun.

Pour one tablespoon of the peanut oil into a skillet or sauté pan and, over a medium flame, heat the oil to shimmering. Add in the onion, garlic, ginger, Thai chili, and salt. Sweat the vegetables until all of the onion is translucent. Muy importante. If you mix the vegetables into the crab without sweating them first, they'll release their liquor into the crab cakes, which will make them fall apart.

In a large bowl, combine the crab with the egg and the sweated vegetables. Pour the panko into a second bowl. Mix the ingredients thoroughly and form it into cakes. You should be able to get nine or ten two-inch-diameter, inch-thick cakes. Press all sides of each completed cake into the panko. The cakes should be uniformly covered.

Pour a second tablespoon of peanut oil into the skillet and again heat it to shimmering over a medium flame. Arrange the cakes evenly in the skillet (this usually fills my skillet entirely). Cook the crab cakes until brown on one side. Don't turn them or move them around in the skillet for the first four minutes.

Take the crab cakes out of the skillet. I do this by removing the skillet from the flame and placing a plate, upside down, over the skillet and inverting the skillet. Return the skillet to the flame and pour the last tablespoon of peanut oil into the skillet. Once the oil again reaches the shimmering point, return the crab cakes to the skillet (browned side up) for another undisturbed four or so minutes, to brown the other side.

To serve, arrange the crab cakes on a layer of the slaw and drizzle thin parallel lines of the fire honey one direction. Cross the lines of fire honey with lines of the orange reduction.