Mallet,
Please Teaching your child
how to eat crabs
STORY BY JESSICA GREGG | PHOTOS BY DAVID STUCK
Chef Nancy Longo
wears a crab tiara that
her friends gave her.

The first thing that first-time crab
eaters need to know is to take their
time, says Chef Nancy Longo, owner
of Pierpoint Restaurant in Fells Point
and a cooking instructor who has
been leading summer classes for
kids for close to two decades.

Crabs are a social food, a mealtime
favorite when the temperature
is high and the humidity higher.

Don’t rush, she says. And don’t get
discouraged. “Keep picking because
you’ll eventually get it right.”
Here are Longo’s 10 steps for new
crustacean consumers.

1 Cover your table in
newspapers or brown
paper. Paper grocery
bags split open and
laid flat will work as
well. Assemble crab
mallets. “Start feeling
around the pile for the
heaviest crab,” Longo
jokes. 32 WashingtonFAMILY JULY 2019



2
3 4
Place a crab with
its shell side
up and apron
side down. Most
people open a
crab at the apron,
but “I find that
to be the most
useless thing on
the planet,” Longo
says. “It seems
to work better to
pull it from the
corner. It just
works faster.”
With one hand on
the back fin, take
the corner of the
shell and begin to
lift it away from
the crab body.

Remove the fat
and the yellow
matter known as
mustard. Remove
the lungs. Place
these things
inside your
discarded shell.

CRAFT PAPER, BOY AND PLATE OF CRAB:
COURTESY OF GETTY IMAGES
5 6
Take the body and break
into two pieces. Take one
piece, smash it down
with your fingers and
pull the top shell away
from the body and the
legs. Pull the crabmeat
from this piece.

Take off the two
claws and put
them in a pile.

“I’m one of those
people who
eat them last,”
Longo says.

WashingtonFAMILY.com 33