A Pound of (Crab) Flesh

Ahoy, Portia!

The weather here has been so hot and-- if you'll excuse my metaphorical Bouillabaisse-- so clammy that we've resorted to un-cooking.

What is un-cooking? A case in point: when we had some friends over for dinner the other night, the dinner consisted of a salade composée and a crab gazpacho. The crab had been cooked, but not by us. Hence, we un-cooked it. Everything in the dinner was served cool.

The weather remains stiflyingly humid; we feel more lugubrious and heavy each day. Yet the chilled gazpacho lingers fondly in the memory because in addition to its coolness, it offered just enough spice to invigorate our weary, burdened flesh.

Here's how to make the gazpacho; the recipe is adapted from the Silver Palate (based on the, er, "research" for my post the other day):

In a food processor, grind up 2 cups fresh bread crumbs (or grind up some slate baguette to make bread crumbs) along with 3 cloves minced garlic. Place this in a serving bowl.

Then, in the processor, add 1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, and roughly chopped; 2 red peppers, seeded and chopped (or green peppers); 3 jalapeno peppers, seeded and chopped; 1 medium red onion, chopped; and some ripe tomatoes, seeded and chopped. Or not seeded, if you're me.

Pulse this several times, until it's evenly chopped but still slightly chunky. Pour roughly half the mixture into the bowl and stir to combine with the breadcrumbs.

To the remaining mixture, add 5 cups tomato juice and the juice of 4 limes, and blend till smooth. Pour this mixture into the bowl and combine; then add 1/2 cup olive oil, or less. Stir, and season with cumin and salt. Chill

Before serving, add 1 pound lump crabmeat and 1 diced avocado; we served the avocado in the individual bowls, and then passed around a bowl of crabmeat for our guests to serve themselves.

The next day, we had some leftover crab, and made wonderful crab salad sandwiches: sliced heirloom tomatoes, avocado, and old bay-seasoned crabmeat in toasted baguettes.

The heat's worth the pound of crab, I think.