Fried Mud Crabs with Salted Egg Yolk sauce

 

It’s salted egg yolks dish again! I am making fried mud crabs in salted egg yolk sauce for this time. I hope everyone do not get tired of seeing something "salted egg yolks" all the time.  I am really a hardcore salted egg fan. Salted eggs are extremely inexpensive, going for 4 for RM5. However, dishes ordered outside that cooked with salted egg yolks are frequently very costly, particularly seafood.

So I might as well cook my own salted egg yolk dishes at home and even with seafood. Additionally, while it's rare to find restaurants that use generous amounts of salted egg yolk sauce to the dish, I can use it freely at home.

The process is usually the same as for other dishes using salted egg yolks. Another reason I adore salted egg yolks is that they cook up with a beautiful, bright golden hue, making them very photogenic foods to begin with. The dish still appears delicious and alluring even without any garnishing.

When you look up the recipe online, you will see that some of the recipe is using custard powder to add a milky flavour and creamy to the salted egg yolks. Or added evaporated milk to the egg yolk and turned out the sauce is too thick, creamy, and buttery but couldn’t really taste the salted eggs. Apart from the steamed mashed salted egg yolk, I always add in one tablespoon of my own salted egg yolk sauce to the dish. I can taste the small egg yolk particles from the mashed egg yolks as well as the creaminess thick egg yolk sauce hangs over the food.

For this recipe, I only use crab pieces; I steam the crab craws and save the meat for later dishes, but you are welcome to cook the crab craws along with them. My recipe included my homemade salted egg yolk sauce. You may refer my version of salted egg yolk sauce from my Fried lotus root recipe.  Alternately, you can omit it and simply use more pureed salted egg yolk and butter.

I am pretty happy with my version. The flavour of the salted egg yolks was so concentrated, and I simply love the sandy texture. As you break down each morsel of salted egg in your mouth, the flavour becomes more and more intense and goes straight to your brain.

 

INGREDIENTS

6 medium size of mud crabs

Some potato starch for coating

Some cooking oil for frying

50g butter

5 bird eye chilies, chopped

2 stems of curry leaves

4 salted egg yolks, steamed and mashed

2 tbsp homemade salted egg sauce

1 tsp sugar

METHOD

1. Take the crab's carapace off. Wash, scrub and remove the top shell and the lungs. The crabs were cut in half. Keep chilled until you are ready to use.

2. Slightly coated the crabs with potato starch piece by piece.  Shake off the excess flour.

3. Place the oil into a sizable saucepan or frying pan with a deep bottom. Carefully add the coated crabs to the heated oil. To prevent the pan from being overcrowded, keep the crabs equally spaced out. They should be fried in heated oil for 2 to 3 minutes on each side or until golden brown. 

4. Add butter to a heated wok over medium heat. Once the butter has melted, add chilies, and curry leaves, and stir until the mixture is fragrant and the curry leaves are beginning to become slightly crispy. Add the salted egg sauce, salted egg yolk crumbs, and sugar, and stir until the butter and salted egg are completely incorporated. Add the fried crabs to the egg yolk mixture and stir over LOW HEAT until all the crabs are thoroughly coated with egg yolk sauce.

 

Hope you find this guide useful and enjoy these fried mud crabs with salted egg sauce to the fullest. Happy cooking!!