This is the story of a picky eater who does eat shellfish. That would be me.
I eat shrimp, lobster, conch, clams and crab. For lobster and crab, I don't eat much except for the tail and legs, and if I haven't got my fill, I'll go inside the carapace and pick at the inside muscles of the legs, but that is about it.
And when I get the muscle out of whatever it it, I have to clean it off. I don't want guts all over it, though I do eat steamers which IS the guts.
I used to go crabbing in the Chesapeake bay with my dad as a kid, getting up at 3:30 AM, me and my two older brothers and my dad, gather up the nets and bushel baskets, rent a little powerboat, and head to the pilings sticking out of the water. The crabs would be clinging to the sides of the pilings, so we would lower chicken necks tied to strings into the water near a crab, and when they grabbed it, we would pull it up and scoop them with nets before they let go and tried to swim away.
We has six hungry kids, so this was something my parents could feed us that was only limited in quantity by how many bushel baskets we came home with, so we did it often.
My mother would cover the table with newspapers, and with the big pot on the stove with water on the bottom, using big tongs, would transfer the crabs one by one into the pot. She would throw in three or four, pause, pour (not sprinkle...pour) Old Bay Seasoning all over them. Then transfer a few more, stop, and pour more seasoning, making a crab and Old Bay parfait until they were all the way to the top. She covered it and steamed them, and when they were done, she would pile all the crabs on cookie sheets and put them on the table where we would devour them. I was always squeamish about the insides, but I ate the claws and legs. I used to spike my butter just like my mom, with scads and scads of ground black pepper, lemon juice, and...Tabasco sauce! I would extract the meat, and throw it into my butter-bowl concoction to marinate for a few minutes, then take a break from cracking the claws to eat that crab in the hot butter. This was ingrained into me, this love of Blue Crabs.
I went to a conference in Baltimore some years back, and the vendor took us out to a crab house, steamed crabs covered with Old Bay Seasoning, and lots of butter, all you could eat. I tore into those things like a fox tears through a henhouse, and smashing them with wooden mallets, I was piling up carcasses while bits of crab, shell, and crab guts were flying around. The majority of the people in the group were from the midwest, and seeing their faces of fascinated horror as they watched me eat, I am certain they thought I was a brutal, carnivorous madman piling up the crab carcasses trophy-like, looking for all the world like Vlad the Impaler to them.
Those days have been long gone, and I don't have access to crabs like that, but my wife went to a high end seafood market a few weeks ago and came home with a couple of Blue Crabs for me to cook! However, when I looked at them, they were softshell crabs, which, to my squeamish palate, were not something I had ever tried or wanted to try.
A Delicacy, I am told, but...I am largely a leg and claw guy, and that is it.
I blanched as she looked eagerly at me, and it was such a thoughtful and nice gesture (she didn't know they were softshell crabs) that...I knew I was going to have to cook them and eat them. When I looked at the price, they were bloody expensive, and I KNEW I was going to have to try to eat them.
There was no way around it.
So, having never cooked a softshell crab, I went online and found some recipies. I noted the package from the seafood market, and it said the gills were removed and the faces with eyes and mandibles were taken off, so...well...some of the objectionable things to me were gone, so...here goes.
I soaked the crabs in milk for about 30 min like the recipe said, then drained them and dredged them in flour with black pepper and Old Bay Seasoning mixed in until they were coated. In a cast iron frying pan, I heated up some vegetable oil and butter, then plopped them in and cooked them for about four minutes on each side.
Dang! They came out looking kind of like I would expect them to, so...how bad could this be?
Heh, so...I sit down (she has already eaten her dinner) and she sits across from me looking adoringly at me, wanting to see how much pleasure she has brought me with this quite extravagant gift which from my many stories, knows it is a favorite dish from my childhood.
I looked down at these foreign looking things, and was completely intimidated by my own squeamishness and filled with trepidation. I have never been an adventurous eater.
I sat there trying to work up the nerve, and glanced up to see her eager, smiling face, willing me onwards.
I was trapped. There was no way out.
I gingerly cut off half a claw, placed it in my mouth, and tentatively chewed. There was something entirely foreign about this. I was used to smashing, breaking, bending, twisting and poking to finally hold up that claw muscle as a warrior held up a severed head of his foe, but...here, there was none of that.
But it tasted okay, even as my brain screamed at me this was not the way to enjoy crab, this was abnormal, there should be crunching of shells and such. But even as the sharp edges and crunch were missing, it kind of tasted like crab and besides...what terrible scummy things could be inside a claw? Some crab connective tissue and cartilage (if that is what they call it) along with the muscle.
So I ate all the claws and legs, even the little flippers that for some reason outraged my subconscious as it screamed at me not to eat these little paddles. I was eating slowly, because I knew that, as soon as the claws and legs were gone, I would only have the body left.
And all the stuff inside it. Whatever that would be.
So, I tried to look like I was savoring each bite as she hovered, awaiting my expressions of joy, while my inner brain was screaming through a megaphone at me. It took me, even with my slow and deliberate claw and leg workflow of sawing, chewing, and swallowing, about three minutes to denude that crab of all its appendages, and now the body lay before me awaiting the next phase of consumption.
The Body.
All sectors of my brain were now on full alert, pumping information into the Command Center for directions just like Woody Allen's brain in "Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid To Ask"
EYES: Good God. Are you seeing this? it is a crab. A whole crab. It looks like...a crab. Not what I am used to seeing, that white crabmeat covered with lovely golden melted butter with flecks of black pepper...it looks like it could still be alive even though there are no arms or legs!
MOUTH: Uhhh...no. No. You aren't putting that in here. I have teeth that are afraid of a crunch of shell, and a tongue that is expecting crabmeat and butter, not...this.
EYES: Ummm...guys. She is still looking at us. She isn't going anywhere...still fixed on us. Sorry. I have to divert focus back to The Body.
COMMAND CENTER: EVERYONE! LISTEN UP. We have to eat this. She isn't going to leave the room to use the bathroom, feed the cats, or clean the kitchen. We cannot, under any circumstances, hurt her feelings here. Prepare to commence eating. I want ACCURATE reports coming in. Hands! Can you draw this out for us a bit, give us time to get everything lined up here?
HANDS: We can do that, but...where do you want us to start? Right down the middle?
SUBCONSCIOUS: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! You can't do that! That's where all the really bad stuff is! No! No! There is crab liver there, oh yes, they have livers, squishy things with evil in them! YOU HATE LIVER! And a crab heart, a black thing I am sure, and crab intestines, full of God knows what, dead things, that is for sure, and crab kidneys, crab gallbladders, crab lungs, and...THE BEADY LITTLE LIFELESS CRAB EYES LIKE A DOLLS EYES AND CRAB MOUTH! NOOOOO! YOU CAN'T...
REASON: Hold on, hold on. First, crabs don't have lungs, they have gills, and the package CLEARLY said they removed them. And the eyes. We don't need to pay attention to those things, so we can...
SUBCONSCIOUS: Sure, but all those other things are there! They didn't remove those! So you are going to have to eat all those things, plus the crab connective tissue and crab cartilage, and the crab intestines, and the evil crab liver, and...
REASON: Hey! Give it a break will ya? She isn't going anywhere, so we gotta do this, and you're just bugging everyone out here. Let's just...
EYES: Yes, I just checked. Still there. Still smiling. Still waiting.
SUBCONSCIOUS: Bugging eveyrone out? BUGGING EVERYONE OUT? Look-that's a damned bug body sitting on that plate, and she is trying to get you to eat it. She's too pushy! Too eager. This...she's...too...something's wrong! Did she do this on purpose? Are those squishy and crunchy crab guts filled with Red Tide toxins? Does she know they're bad? Maybe she's trying to get rid of you! Good God! I saw her looking at the life insurance policy yesterday! I saw it! Now this! It's bad enough...
COMMAND CENTER: STOP IT! I WANT ACCURATE REPORTS. HANDS: cut off a corner of the shell where the point on the side is. There are no crab guts there. Cut about one inch in and transfer it to the mouth. I want action now.
COMMUNICATIONS: Sir. I haven't been able to reach STOMACH for some time now, they have been offline. I haven't had any transmission of Appetite Level for a while, and they aren't answering.
COMMAND CENTER: Okay, on my orders, we are proceeding in the absence of a formal communication of Appetite Level. Proceed cutting and transfer to mouth.
HANDS: Aye aye, Sir. Cutting...transfer in progress. Mouth, are you ready?
MOUTH: Sir! It is pandemonium here! We have no saliva, and the tongue appears to be...argh! Incoming! TONGUE: We need a damage control report right now before chewing commences!
TONGUE: We just came back online and readings are coming in...it...it...ah...okay...it kind of tastes like the legs, which passed muster before. Texture is much the same...we can do this part. I can't tell you how relieved we are.
COMMAND CENTER: Okay good job, men. We can do this. HANDS: prepare to cut again as soon as the swallow is executed...
EYES: Sir! Something is wrong. She is looking at us with concern. She...
EARS: (Cutting in) SIR! WE HAVE AUDIO!
COMMAND CENTER: Very well. Bring it up on the 1MC (Overhead Communication System).
EARS: WIFE: What's wrong, dear? Are you okay? You look like you're in pain!
COMMAND CENTER: Dammit! FACE! What the hell are you guys doing up there? Are you sleeping on watch?
FACE: Sir, sorry. We left the FES (Facial Expression Setting) on AUTO, and it was automatically selecting a fear and disgust expression based on all the negative input from the MOUTH, TONGUE and SUBCONSCIOUS, and with absence of the Appetite Input, that was set to zero, which caused...
COMMAND CENTER: Stow the excuses. Clear that face, put on something as close to pleasure as you can, and VOICE, reassure her that everything is just fine.
VOICE: (over 1MC System) ME: No...no...it's...it's, er...fine...uh...
COMMAND CENTER: FOR GOD'S SAKE WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? STOP STUTTERING! She will see right through us! HANDS: Where are we with that next cut?
HANDS: We are proceeding, Sir, but indications are we are cutting into an area where internal crab organs might be found, so we thought-
SUBCONSCIOUS: AGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH! THAT'S WHERE ALL THE WORST THINGS ARE! CRAB GUTS! CRAB CARTILAGE AND CRAB TENDONS WITH SQUISHY CRAB INTESTINES AND CRAB LIVER...
COMMAND CENTER: Control, take the SUBCONSCIOUS offline. I'll assume that function until we have a repair party over there. HANDS, get that damned hunk of crab body in the mouth, get it chewed and get it swallowed, and do it now! We have to finish this now, or we're going to lose it. CUT AND TRANSFER NOW!
EYES: Sir! A scan shows a non-uniform distribution of tissue structures where we cut! It appears to be a variety of internal organs and cartilage based internal leg muscle-cabinets! This might be tough for the mouth to process-I think we HAVE to bring REASON into play to make this all work!
COMMAND CENTER: Agreed. Control, bring up REASON.
CONTROL: Aye aye, Sir. (Mashes button for REASON, but under pressure, hits the SUBCONSCIOUS button and brings it back online, piping the sound through the 1MC Overhead Communciation System)
SUBCONSCIOUS: AAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
FACE: Sir the signal from SUBCONSCIOUS was at such a negative level that we got the signal to project fear, disgust, panic, and pain all at the same time! Initial indications from EYES are that she saw it.
EYES: Oh, yeah. She saw it.
SEX ORGANS: Yeah. We've seen THAT look before. We're sleeping on the couch tonight...