No. 198

Bisque of Crabs

Bisque de Crabes

Put twenty-four live crabs in cold water with a little salt, and leave them to soak for one hour, mince four ounces of carrot and the same quantity of onion, fry them in butter in a saucepan sufficiently large to contain all the crabs, add some parsley sprigs, thyme and bay leaf, season with salt, half a bottle of white wine and some white stock, then cover and cook for fifteen minutes; lift out the crabs, strain the broth, and set it aside to rest, pouring off the top twenty-five minutes later. Remove the shells from the crabs; pick out the lungs from both sides, wash each one separately in tepid water and suppress the small legs, then drain well and pound them to a paste with half their quantity of cooked rice, dilute this puree with some of the juice they were cooked in, drain through a sieve and then a tammy and mix in one pint of bechamel (No. 409). Season with salt and red pepper, heat up without boiling and just when ready to serve, incorporate therein a quarter of a pound of fine butter, stirring it well with a spoon until it be completely melted. Pour the very hot bisque into a soup tureen and serve separately a garnishing of pieces of bread cut into one quarter of an inch squares and fried in butter; divide them by putting six or eight in each separate soup-plate when serving.

← No. 197 Bisque or Puree of Clams a la Hendrick Soups & Broths No. 199 Bisque of Crabs a la Stevens →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's bisque is built the old way: whole crustaceans pounded to a paste with rice, then pushed through cloth. The method still works, but several steps assume equipment and vocabulary that have gone out of use.

The crabsTwenty-four crabs at Delmonico's most likely means small hard-shell blue crabs, though the recipe gives no species, size or weight. Larger Dungeness or rock crab will need proportionally fewer.
A step is implied, not statedThe crabs go into the pot with the wine, stock and vegetables before the fifteen minutes of covered cooking; the text only mentions lifting them out. Make sure the pan is wide enough that they sit in one or two layers.
"Lungs" means gillsThe feathery grey-white fingers along both sides under the top shell are the gills, sometimes called dead man's fingers. They are not toxic, but they are bitter and gritty and will spoil the puree. Remove the apron and stomach sac as well.
Half a bottle of white wineAbout 12 fl oz, or 1½ cups, in a period bottle. Use something dry and unoaked.
Pounding, then tammyA tammy is a fine worsted cloth through which the puree was wrung by two people twisting opposite ends. A food processor will do the pounding of shells and rice, and a chinois pressed hard with a ladle followed by a pass through several layers of damp muslin gives the same result. Sieve twice; shell splinters are the failure mode of this soup.
The resting brothLetting the strained cooking liquid stand twenty-five minutes and pouring off the top is clarification by settling — the clear liquid above the sediment is what you use to loosen the puree.
Red pepperCayenne, used sparingly; Ranhofer names paprika separately elsewhere when he wants it.
The hinge: no boiling after the béchamelHeat the finished bisque only to steaming, as the recipe directs. A boil risks curdling the puree, and the quarter pound of butter stirred in at the last moment will break outright. The recipe has it worked in with a spoon just before serving; taking the pan off the heat makes that easier.
Yield and serviceThe recipe gives no yield or number of servings. The fried bread is croutons, cut ¼ inch and divided six or eight per soup-plate at serving rather than stirred into the tureen, so they stay crisp.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty-odd years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its soup chapter is essentially the classical French repertoire transplanted to American ingredients. Bisque originally described a thick, highly seasoned soup that could be made of poultry or game as readily as shellfish; the narrowing of the word to mean a strained crustacean puree happened over the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and this recipe sits at the end of that shift. The rice pounded with the shells is the older thickener, predating the roux-based béchamel that Ranhofer also adds — the two techniques overlap in one bowl. The finishing butter, stirred in off the heat at the last moment, is the monter au beurre that gives a French kitchen bisque its gloss, and it is the reason the soup must never be reheated to a boil.