Conondrum solved
The world is worried about food. Protein to be exact. Rightly so, proteins are indeed a problem if 10 billion people want to eat fish and meat like the west does. There’s talk about ’transition’. So why not start to harvest (not decimate) the plagues in the seas and oceans?
Crab meat from Crustalicious fills that void. High in protein (75%!), ideal in the Omega-3 to 6 department, almost no fat and – most important – very, very good to eat. Dumplings, crab soufflé, dimsum, crab cakes, crab balls, wontons, surimi from real crab, and much, much more. We can even imagine crab bread, crab pizza or Crab Wellington. Please let us know if you have another great idea.
The plague and how we can make good use of them
No less than 8.600 species of crab roam the seven seas of the world. Many of them too small to use, because in crab – unlike shrimp and lobster – the edible parts are in many different compartments, making extraction next to impossible. If you ever ate a (most likely large) crab, you know what this means. You spend two hours with a nice bottle of white wine, opening the shell and clawing your way through all those compartments. Ending up with a very labour intensive, yet delicious lunch.
The larger crab species do get caught and land at the fish auctions. The smaller ones only in very small quantities, which are used as a basis for soups, stocks and sauces. Leaving 99,9% in the oceans.
Crustalicious developed an autonomous processing line, capable of extracting the meat from these by catch crabs with almost no human labour required. Ending up with clean, very healthy and very nutritious (75% protein!) uncooked crab meat that can be used in every recipe you can think of. Dumplings, crab cakes, ravioli, dim sum, harty pancakes, soufflé, gyoza, Thai fish balls, wontons, surimi, bapao, burgers, you name it. If it could contain crab flavor, you can use the paste.
See the process
Crab facts
Crabs have large compound eyes made up
of hundreds of tiny lenses.
There are different kind
of crabs we find and process
From our factory at the former fish auction at Colijnsplaat, Holland, we process several species of crab that form nuisances.Pests really.
First of all, the green crab (Carcinus Maenas) that feeds of the young mussels in the Wadden Sea and has invaded large portions of the coastline aswell as the largest European saltwater lake Grevelingen. Upto 95% of everything caught in these waters can be green crab at times, and at the moment there is little or no market for them.
Secondly, the exotic Chinese Mitten Crab (Eriocheir sinensis) that has hitchhiked its way to Europe in ballast tanks several decades ago and begun their claim to fame in all sweet water bodies the continent has. By the billions… Very popular in China are the bigger males, but unfortunately the so-called ‘brown meat’ contains too much PCB’s and heavy metals for the fishermen to be allowed to catch them. That is, until we stepped in. Our machine removes the dark meat and thereby removes all PCB’s and heavy metals, leaving you a clean, fresh and delicious product to use as an ingredient.
Those two species will be available as meat/paste in 2025.
Third, the Velvet swimming crab or Necora Puber that is a nuisance to especially crab fishermen and shrimping boats. Light, almost sweet in taste.
Fourth in line, the exotic Blue Swimmer crab from the Adriatic sea near Venice. Strong enough to crack even the adult clams that make up the famous Italian ‘Pasta Vongolé’ dish. Light colored, light in taste.
Last but not least, the bodies of the Brown Crab (Cancer pagurus) of which the claws have some value to the fishermen, but the bodies that are left have not. These can be turned into fresh delicious crab meat by us aswel. Sweet velvety flavor.
Globally though, many more species would be applicable for processing by our machine. Safe, cheap and sustainable.
Chinese Mitten Crab
Chinese Mitten Crab
Eriocheir sinensis. Plague and exotic in our waters. Delicacy in China. Dream catch for the inland fishermen.
Beach Crab
Beach Crab
Carcinus maenas. Abundant local specy. Basis of all Bisque d'Homards. Our favorite global plague.
Brown Crab
Brown Crab
Cancer pagurus. Delicate flavour. Their claws are used, their bodies were not. Untill we stepped in.
