Ketchikan and King Crab

Leslie Monday, June 2, 2008

Today appeared as if it would rain all day. Our day began by taking Molly to the vet. She’s had a swollen lump under her left jawbone. Although it didn’t seem to bother her, it really worried us. Because this is the largest town we’ll visit this month, we really wanted to have her checked here. The vet took a needle biopsy and sent the slide to Seattle. He gave us some antibiotic to take along in case the biopsy comes back with a report of infection. (He called on Tuesday and reported that the biopsy report indicated that the lump is not cancer and is most likely an infection from her tooth issues. We’re now committed to brushing both cats’ teeth every day.)

We spent part of the day watching the crazy fishermen out in open boats in the pouring rain. They didn’t appear to be catching anything. Because of all the rain I was afraid that I wouldn’t have any pictures to post. How wrong I turned out to be.

As Robert written a few days ago, we had ordered a live King Crab from our fishmonger. He had told us that these would be the last live King Crabs of the season. We stopped by the fishmonger around 6:30 pm. The crabs had just arrived. He was fishing them out of the cold box in which they had traveled to Kitchikan. He offered that Robert could select his favorite crab.

Those of you who watch the Discovery channel’s Most Dangerous Catch know these crabs are very large – and they have big claws.

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Notice our rain gear. We looked right in place in town. (This picture is out of focus but I wanted to show the size of the King Crab.)

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After we selected the crab, he was weighed. This crab weighed 9 lbs, 12 oz. Big CRAB.

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The fishmonger had offered that he would split and gut the crab. We gladly accepted. Look at the size of that knife.

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He had also told us that the perfect way to cook the crab would be to wrap each leg in foil with butter and garlic and grill it for 18 minutes. Because of the pouring rain, we were concerned about grilling the crab. Unfortunately we don’t have a pan anywhere large enough to boil all this crab. We decided to stop at the store and look for a big crab pot. Luckily we were successful.

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Robert unwrapped the crab and figured out how we could fit the crab in the pot.

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Here’s Robert showing off a crab claw.

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After the water was boiling, the we placed the crab in the pot. Poor crab!

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Here’s a portion of the cooked crab on the table.

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And each of us just before eating some crab. We put the picnic table cloth over the dining room table and used dish towels as bibs. My newest trick for eating messy crab is to wear gloves. We each have a box of disposable latex gloves for messy jobs around the rig. By keeping the crab from getting under my fingernails, it was easier to pick out the meat.

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We enjoyed a wonderful dinner of just crab. We’ll get at least two more dinners from this crab. We both report that fresh crab tastes far superior to previously frozen crab. The shell is also easier to open. You don’t have to use a cracker; we were able to cut the shell on the legs and just use a fork to pick out the crab meat. Yum.

Molly and Cody enjoyed sleeping in on this rainy day.

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Tomorrow is our last day in Ketchikan. On Wednesday we will board the ferry for a 6 hour trip to Wrangell. Tomorrow I’ll write more details of town of Ketchikan.

More later,
Leslie