Blue might just be my favorite color

The last weekend of August, N's parents (my surrogate parents), E and D, came down for a visit. 

The joke has been for some time now, that N’s mom is the harbinger of bad weather.  Two winters ago, she visited only to find herself snowed in with the rest of us during what became referred to as “Snowpacolypse.”  The following summer her visit punctuated an 18-day heat wave during which temperatures soared above 110 every day.  And now, her visit, along with her husband, began as the Washington DC metro area braced for the onslaught of Hurricane Irene, predicted to make landfall as a Category 2 hurricane and the first the DC area had seen since 2002.

But as with her other visits, we did not allow the impending weather to dissuade us from our pursuits.  In this case, that pursuit was of Maryland blue crab at Quarterdeck in Arlington, VA.  While Maryland blue crabs are easy to come by in the Chesapeake Bay area, finding a fresh crab place in Arlington is not as easy.  As a result, Quarterdeck gets crowded as throngs of people come every night to order, crack and eat dozens of the Maryland delicacy. We joined the throngs a little ahead of the game since N had made a reservation. Seated inside at a table covered in brown paper, we ordered two dozens crabs for our table of six and then settled in to chat for the 20 minutes we’d have to wait for our bright orange crustacean meal.   

While we waited we opened the gifts generously brought to us by N’s parents.  M, B and I had each arrived to find colorful gift bags in our chairs.  Cracking into ours, B and I were thrilled to find an apron each.  While the aprons themselves matched, the print on each was clearly selected to match our personalities as much as our cooking.  We loved them!

My apron, clearly selected to represent my Mediteranean roots

 B's apron, chosen to compliment his winning personality ;-)

By the time we’d opened our gifts, we had just a few minutes to chat before our crabs arrived.  Heaped onto the table waiting for us, they were steaming and incredible.  It took a lot of self-restraint not to grab hold of one immediately. But those shells will burn your hands when they’re hot. 

 Our pile of Maryland blue crabs

Finally, they were cool enough to touch and we wasted no time getting down to business.  For anyone who’s never eaten whole crabs, these suckers are a lot of work.  You have to pull off the breastplate, scrape away the lungs (yuck) and, if you’re most people, scrap away the “mustard” that fills in the gaps in the crab’s body.  Strictly speaking, this “mustard” is edible, but it has a strong taste and few people like it.  Once that’s done, you can start scooping out the pockets of sweet crab meat all along the sides.  The legs also contain meat, but depending on the size of the crab some people forgo them as they are sometimes more work than they are worth.  Having ordered medium crabs (no large available that night), the legs were large enough to eat and filled with the same sweet meat you come to expect inside the crab cavity.  

We spent nearly an hour cracking and eating crab, each breaking down around 4 per person.  Breaking down crabs is messy business too.  Since B and I had each come right from work, we used extra caution to avoid spraying crab bits all over ourselves.  To no avail, both my skirt and his pants had to be taken to the dry cleaner the next day.  But was it worth it! We got a great chance to catch up with some of the people I love most in the world all while enjoying a tremendous meal, unique to the area in which we live.  Life doesn’t get much better.

 E, N and D at dinner – love N’s face

Eventually, we surrendered, having not left a single crab on the table.  We knew we’d soon have to pack it in and get home (or to the grocery store) to prepare for the coming storm.  As we were leaving the restaurant, my Dad, worried about the inclement weather texted to make sure we were ready and okay.  It was easy to reply that yes, we had what we needed and besides, my surrogate parents were here, so everything would be alright.