Arrest of Atzerodt

[jonathan]

Laurie, actually she fried them in the shell. I think she either broke off the top hard shell somehow, or cut it off from underneath, because I don't remember ever having to eat around that. All I remember was the softer undershell, which of course still wasn't soft enough to eat. She would cut them into halves or quarters, fry them, and just serve up this huge plate of them. I think she also broke the big legs off and did them separately, but they weren't as good as the bodies. So you'd have these halves or quarters of the bodies with the smaller legs attached, then separately you'd have the big legs with the claws. Either way, you'd still have to pick the meat out yourself, but it was soooo worth it, as crab always is. Those crab melts sound fantastic too though.

As far as catching them, we'd put one average sized crab pot out in the water a ways and let it fill up, then we'd have the strings with pieces of meat tied to the end. It's been so long, I don't remember what kind of meat it was, but I'm almost positive it wasn't bacon. I would expect chicken. I also remember that while we were waiting, us kids would chase fiddler crabs on the beach, just for fun. It was a good time.