Maryland Crabs - Anyone buy them and ship

[Redpoppy]

I'm thinking of sending my parents crabs as a Christmas gift. They don't need anything and my mom would love them.

My mom always handles the crab buying on vacation. She grew up in Baltimore. I can't ask her without blowing the surprise.

Anyone do this? Do I order them live or steamed? What size and how many for two people? Is bigger better? I see a bunch of sites for this but am stumped on how to buy them.

Thanks for any assistance.

[cahabalily]

Chick and Ruth's in Annapolis ships crab cakes...

I think you'll be hard pressed to find blue crabs shipped because they have to be kept alive prior to cooking.

[cahabalily]

Oops, I see your question, lol

You can order them steamed. The number depends on the size of the crab. For a meal, I would do three or four jumbos pp.

H and I can eat thirty small crabs between the two of us. And I would do jumbos.

[Redpoppy]

I feel like her family just gets them off the side of the road from someone selling them. I ran out of patience after a crab or two. Seems like jumbos are by the dozen so that would work. Thanks!

[rubytue]

You'll be hard pressed to find MD crabs for Christmas since commercial crab season ends 12/15. At least up here in the upper bay, we've been seeing them shut down and clean up for the season. H said he was out about 2 weeks ago and saw folks pulling their pots and cleaning them up.

All this is to say, if you are ordering crabs for Christmas, they likely won't be MD crabs. Perhaps send them some G&M crab cakes? gandmcrabcakes.com/online-only.html

eta: link to season

[winemaker06]

Agree with RubyTue that shipping G&M crab cakes would be a nice gift for this time of year. And they are quite large, so 1-2 per person is plenty.

[satama]

Another Marylander voting for crab cakes instead of whole crabs.

[y4m]

Agree with others that md crab will be out of season then, so I'd stick with crab cakes. If you want to ship whole crab--what about Dungeoness out of WA/CA? It's delicious this time of year.

[Deleted]

Nov 24, 2012 21:22:04 GMT -5 winemaker06 said:

Agree with RubyTue that shipping G&M crab cakes would be a nice gift for this time of year. And they are quite large, so 1-2 per person is plenty.

THIS! G&M is the. absolute. best. ever.

Your parents will be so happy.

[HitchedIn2006]

Ditto the PP suggestion of G & M crab cakes. DH ordered them for Valentine's Day a few years ago. Very well worth it!!