THE BLUE FISH 7-18-09

Mmmm, crab cake tasting again this weekend. Yummy good times. We had dinner at The Blue Fish on Greenville Avenue Saturday night. Their incarnation of crab cake is served with a few bits off odd fluff. Like edible royalty, the cake arrived with a crown of unknown, flavorless fried things on the top, seated upon a thrown of mashed potatoes - wait, mashed potatoes? Neither of these added any flavor to the dish, but the presentation was certainly regal. The cake was nice and warm, freshly prepared, with a nice, crisp, golden grill top and bottom and a sprinkling of sesame seeds. Made from lump blue crab (what else?), Maryland style, the cake contained a healthy amount of crab meat and was appropriately scarce on food-glue. I didn't find the crab meat itself to be particularly delightful to my taste buds as it was a little on the fishy side, but this would not deter me from ordering it again. Could have just been an off night. At $13, this was certainly an excellent deal. Meow~

MORTON'S THE STEAKHOUSE 7-11-09

Last night we made a stop downtown at Morton's. The crab cakes there were the best I've had in Dallas since my favorite place to have them went out of business. Yummy, fresh and served Maryland-style, a $40 dinner plate includes three cakes with giant lumps of crab meat and a minimum of food-glue additive to hold them together. There didn't appear to be much butter or oil added either, which was quite nice. The presentation was strange with the line of cakes accentuating the big empty space on the plate, and the gelatinous glop of unidentifiable condiment having a devilishly undesirable appearance and texture. Feh! We ordered a couple of heavily spiced sides (Caesar salad, garlic green beans) which I would not order again - the flavors were so loud that they interfered with the delicate flavor of the crab. Plus, the crab cakes alone were such a hefty order that I could not eat them all. Thanks to my friend Lauren Z. for suggesting Morton's. Meow~

PAPPADEAUX 9-13-08

An early crab cake expedition that wasn't captured in photos... Pappadeaux's jumbo lump crab cakes served over crawfish in a light butter sauce certainly didn't suck, but they were pretty middle-of-the-road. To use the words "jumbo" and "lump" in the description is not accurate in the least. The two rather smallish cakes were made with the minimum of lump, more like crab mush, and they were very heavy, oily, and covered up with millions of other flavors. I prefer a crab cake that allows the flavor of the crab to sing, to dance in my mouth, instead of hiding behind a parade of other performers. At $18.95, not cakes I would return for. Meow~