Our giant crab
My job requires that I pay attention to Twitter during every waking hour, so when I saw a local blogger mentioned a contest closing that day, I went to her blog to check it out. She was asked to review a seafood restaurant, and the chef agreed to give one “reader a chance to cook up an epic meal for someone special along with him at Pebbles one evening.”
All you had to do was describe your someone special. I did. And I won.
So, Saturday night we headed off to Juhu for our meal at Pebbles—after getting absolutely drenched in the rains trying to hail a rickshaw. The PR lady and the chef greeted us. We sat down, and began to look over the menu. The chef came over and pointed out the special tasting menu. We decided to go for it.
The chef led us over where he had two live crabs waiting for us to decide which one we wanted to eat. Arnab pointed at the larger one. As I posed for pictures, the crab clawed at my scarf and dress. He was heavy!
The chef showed us how to clean (read: cut him into pieces) while he was still alive, instead of throwing him into hot water and holding down the lid. It’s purely based on flavor. I’m almost positive I could never do that myself, but it was interesting to learn how.
The finishing touch
A white apron was tied on as I took my place behind the live kitchen in the dining room. A family with small children also decided to watch the demonstration, so I was a little nervous. The chef dropped the crab legs into the pot and briefly put the cover on. When he lifted the top off mere minutes later, the crab legs were turning a bright orange—the legs twitched and made the little kids jump back.
The crab was delicious as was almost everything else we ate that night. I discovered appam, a bread made out of fermented rice dough, parboiled rice and neer dosa, a crepe-type thing made from rice. My favorite dish was a Keralan coconut curry of tiger prawns. The prawns were good, but it was the sauce that made it great. The tasting menu was four courses: giant crab, soup, main course and dessert. By the time we got to the dessert, we could barely look at food anymore. It might have been the giant crab or it might have been the tiny cheese crackers they kept refilling for us.
All in all, the meal made me certain of two things: crab is best eaten with your hands in a nice restaurant and Kerala is now on my must-go list.
How exciting Abby. Who was the someone special you wrote about:-) Looks like a nice place. Loved seeing a picture of you – you look great. This sounds like one of your more pleasurable experiences so far. XOXO Aunt Sharon
Arnab was my special person, of course. The restaurant is amazing. It’s a bit expensive for us on a regular basis, but the food was great.
Interesting description about how to clean a crab, yes, I too have seen on Travel and Living how its legs turn a bright orange. Neer dosas and appams are awesome and lip smacking delicious.
Neer dosas and appams are incredible. I love food with interesting textures, especially bread. I love Ethiopian food mostly because the injera, or spongy bread, fascinates me. This was my first time having Southern India food, and I’m hooked. I’m a sucker for anything with coconut in it.
yay! now I can put a face to the blogger. Poor poor crab though…if it was my free dinner I’d have to decline just over that. You never did tell us readers how you and Arnab met! Maybe you should post your winning entry?