Photograph by Michael W. Kohlman copyright 2009 with the dish prepared by him also.

Normally for me, Crab Meat being included in something highly spicy for me doesn't generally work. I guess it must have taken a lot of work to find the perfect combination to make that dish pop! When I fist got it, I wasn't happy that there was so little of it on the plate and complained. The waiter assured me that the gave me the perfect amount to enjoy as it was so rich that more would start disagreeing with me. While I expressed my dissatisfaction with other restaurants Crab Imperial, I found them all good, but it wasn't the recipe that I learned to love. There is another version in the Chesapeake Bay Cooking book called, "Smithfield Crab Imperial." It is much less spicy and also uses sour cream.

In reality, when I inquired about the dish for the first time, my mom said that she didn't like it because it was too spicy and rich, but noted that she thought that I surely would. After watching me order it for several years, she commented to several family members joining us at the restaurant that Crab Imperial had an ethereal effect on me. I was a bit shocked as my mother never used big words.

I watched the show, "Chesapeake Bay Cooking, with John Shields," and enjoyed it immensely as it was just down home country cooking from the Eastern Show and to his credit, he did so in preserving the mannerism. It was like I was in the kitchen with them and they were showing me. The cookbook, "Chesapeake Bay Cooking," costs about $30.00 and to me is worth far more in value. For the seafood lover, it hosts a wealth of various recipes as well; for poultry, game and meats, plus plenty of country sides. Ever consider making biscuits with a sledge hammer?

Totally unexpected from that book was the recipe for Crab Imperial and I had to get over my awe of the other crab dishes, the most complete in my wanderings. These days, Jumbo Lump Crab meat is all the rage and it does have a nice flavor and texture, but I prefer to go fifty/fifty using backfin meat. That crab meat is taken from the back part of the crab and is much smaller and has more shell in it to pick out, but it has a really nice crab flavor and more mustard. Mustard is actually the yellow fat of the crab and to me tastes a bit like alligator meat. I think the combination of the two type of crab meat is the perfect combination.

But being very expensive, I only make the dish infrequently and worked out a way to substitute chicken instead. The problem with using chicken meat is it texture, to compensate for this, I pan-fry the diced thigh meat of chicken until just done and then roll it between my thumb and forefinger to break the muscle fibers apart and give it a feathery texture. Crab meat does a wonderful job of absorbing the butter, but I cut that out completely as the chicken meat has enough flavor and fat already. I also use a third of the Mayonnaise that they call for with the crab. I even adapted the recipe to make, "Imperial Crab cakes."

One other thing that I do is with the peppers. They call for either red peppers of pimiento. Since nice and flavorful red peppers can be found all year around, I use them. By the time I find a use for pimiento again, it has molded. With the green peppers, I use jalape??o with half the seeds removed. I like the way it builds the heat up.

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