They have green backs, pink bellies and are only about 2 inches in diameter. The green crab is an invasive predator that’s been destroying clam and scallop populations from South Carolina to Maine — since they were introduced here two centuries ago.
Now, some New England chefs are looking for ways to put this invasive species – on the menu.
“I’m probably gonna upset some of my fisherman friends,” says Brendan Vesey, the chef at The Joinery, an upscale restaurant in Newmarket, N.H. “Because I think Tuna is delicious, and I understand why we catch it, but I currently don’t serve it.”
Why? He says – eating that one big predator at the top of the food chain throws off the whole ecosystem Instead of seared tuna steaks Vesey serves invasive Green Crab Bisque, with seared fish, fresh peas, and house-made bacon.
Fisherman Everett Leach stops by the restaurant to drop 20 pounds of green crabs, clawing and crawling in a plastic bucket. As he stops one from escaping, another crawls out of the bucket.
“Keep an eye on ‘em, they’re runners,” he warns Vesey.
Green crabs are native to Europe and Africa, but arrived in New England two hundred years ago. They eat a lot of the things fisherman are after: clams, oysters, mussels, soft shell crabs, and scallops.
The Maine Clammers Association describes green crabs on their website as “a cancer literally eating away at Maine’s marine resources.”
Quantity is not a problem. There are millions of them. Vesey pays two bucks a pound for these guys — a third what he’d pay for steamer clams, and a ninth what he’d pay for scallops.
He writes the check, and immediately starts tossing the crabs into two big stock pots
“I’m gonna put them in a hot pot with some oil in the bottom and toast the shells up, then I’ll add liquid to make stock,” says Vesay.
For now, stock is about the only thing you can make with these guys. Vesey says you could spend hours shelling all 20 pounds of these crabs and only end up with a half-pound of meat.
“They’re really small, and they are really really hard,” said Vesey. “The shells are rock hard.”
Eventually, Vesey grinds up and strains the shells and the crab meat. He trades the mush — which makes good chicken feed — with a farmer for local eggs. The stock is green and pungent and tastes sweet and rich.
Vesey hopes someday he can do something more with these little critters than just soup.
With blue crabs, for example, the kind you find in Maryland, fishermen have figured out how to catch them just before they shed their shells, then harvest them while they’re naked. That’s soft-shell crab.
“If we had those we could probably get rid of green crabs in a year, cuz everyone wants to eat that,” said Vesey.
It’s been two hundred years since the New England shoreline was free of these invasive predators. Without them — think of all the oysters and scallops there’d be to go around.
