Crab Mango and Avocado Salad Recipe

Friday, June 20, 2008

Crab Mango and Avocado Salad Recipe

Filed under Appetizer, Breakfast and Brunch, Low Carb, Salad, Seafood, Seasonal Favorites: Spring, Wheat-free

I first encountered a crab mango salad at Fringale, the exquisite French-Basque restaurant on 4th St. in San Francisco. Recently at a restaurant in LA I had another delicious crab mango salad, this time with avocado and surrounded by peeled ruby red grapefruit sections. I've been dreaming about it ever since. Scouring the Internet I came up with several recipes and decided to create my own from the ideas of several. It turned out delicous, though my grapefruit sections fell apart completely and ended up being too much of a bother to include with the salad this time.

Crab Mango and Avocado Salad Recipe

Ingredients

For the sauce:

• 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 ripe mango, peeled, pitted and diced
• 1/4 cup of water
• 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
• Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
• For the salad: 1 lb of fresh lump Dungeness crabmeat, picked through to remove the small pieces of shell or cartilage
• 1 1/2 Tbsp freshly squeezed lime juice
• 3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 Tbsp cilantro leaves, finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons mint leaves, finely chopped
• 1 Tbsp minced shallot or purple onion
• 1 medium sized mango, peeled, pitted, and diced (See How to Cut a Mango)
• 1 firm but ripe avocado, pitted, peeled, and diced
• Tabasco sauce
• Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Optional: ruby red grapefruit sections, peeled

Method

Sauce directions:
Heat the olive oil in a small pan over medium heat. Add the mango, season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring, for about 3 minutes until the fruit is very tender. Add water, bring to a boil and remove from heat. Stir in lemon juice. Pour the mixture into a blender and purée until smooth. Chill.

Alternatively, if you are pressed for time, put all of the sauce ingredients into a blender and purée.

Crab salad directions:
In a bowl add the crab meat, 2 tsp of the cilantro, 1 tsp of the mint, the chopped shallot, a Tbsp of lime juice, 2 Tbsp of olive oil, 10 drops of Tabasco sauce, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix carefully with a fork, to avoid breaking up the larger lumps of crab meat. Set aside.

In a separate bowl add the mango, avocado, 1 Tbsp olive oil, 1/2 Tbsp of lime juice, the remaining cilantro and mint leaves, 10 drops of Tabasco, and salt and pepper to taste. Mix gently with a spoon, taking care not to mush the avocado pieces.

Using small tureens or desert bowls for individual molds, layer the crab mixture and the mango avocado mixture. It doesn't really matter which you layer first. In the photo above I've layered the mango avocado mixture first. Chill in the refrigerator for 1 to 2 hours.

When you are ready to serve, gently remove the salads from the molds onto individual plates. Serve the sauce on the side. Garnish with cilantro leaves. For a tasty added touch if you have them, arrange peeled sections of ruby red grapefruit around the salads. The grapefruit provides a flavorful complement to the crab salad.

Serves 4.