Pasta with Crabs (Granchi alla Marinara)
My signature dish. A Napoletana Christmas Eve staple, we ate this every year as a first course as part of the Cena della Viglia feast, or as some call it, the Feast of the 7 Fishes. Best when made a whole day before you eat it, you may call this Southern Italian “Liquid Gold” by other names, or use spaghetti instead of linguine, but if you know it, you appreciate that the sweet flavor of this sauce is second to none. Convinced that blue crab sauce runs through my veins, I have no words to describe how amazing the smell of this sauce is bubbling on the stove. By no means a first date meal, be prepared to put on a bib and get down and dirty cracking the crabs. Getting to the claw meat makes this sauce all the more worth it. Mentally, each time I make it, I am transported to Christmas Eves past, when everyone was around the table, and times were simple. Isn’t that what we all want from the dishes we make?
Ingredients
- 12 fresh large, cleaned blue claw crabs (preferably males)
- 3 – 28-ounce cans of peeled San Marzano tomatoes
- 3 – 28-ounce cans of crushed San Marzano tomatoes
- 1 1/4 cups of extra virgin olive oil
- 9 cloves of garlic, peeled, smashed and minced
- 4 tablespoons of chopped flat leaf parsley
- 1 1/2 tablespoons (or more) of red pepper flakes, to taste
- 2 cups of fresh basil leaves, plus more for serving
- Kosher salt
- Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 2 pounds of linguine or spaghetti
Instructions
- Open the 6 tomato cans. Empty the contents of the 3 cans of peeled tomatoes into a large bowl. Crush the tomatoes by hand with clean hands or use a masher (I like them chunky, so I don’t like to over crush).
- Heat oil in an extra-large pot over medium to high heat. Once it’s hot add the garlic and cook for a minute or two until it is fragrant and golden brown, but never burnt.
- Add all the tomatoes into the pot of garlic and oil. Then add the parsley and red pepper flakes.
- Turn the heat up high and add the crabs. When the sauce starts boiling, lower the heat to simmer and cook for about an hour, stirring occasionally. Add half the basil, stir more. Cook the sauce for about 3 hours on the lowest simmer possible. Add the rest of the basil right before serving.
- When the sauce is ready, you can serve as is. But it’s best to cool it down and then refrigerate overnight and eat it the next day so the crab flavor really penetrates the sauce.
- When it’s time to serve, bring a large pot of well-salted water to a boil (always salt the water after it boils or it will take longer). Add the linguine and cook it until al dente. Drain.
- Place the pasta in a large serving bowl or platter. Pour the crab sauce over the pasta and you can scatter with more basil on top as well as black and/or red pepper. Serve with crabs on the side and lots of bread for dipping.
