Lump This, Stupid Fishmonger

My excuse is we cooked all weekend. That's why Loki ate a banana and croutons for dinner and we're ordering sushi.

Before you go ahead and call child protective services, I actually made Loki wholewheat pasta shells and cheese with steamed carrots. What he ate was a banana (me) and a handful of croutons (Herb). In Herb's words "what's the difference between croutons and a piece of toast?" I invite you - no, I implore you- to respond to this challenge. Why is it a bad idea to give your hungry two-year-old a box of croutons for dinner? Anyone? Maybe he'll listen to you; my opinion is fairly useless.

As I was saying, we cooked all weekend - it being that kind of weekend. My mom was up for a visit so I took the opportunity on Friday night to breakout some real homestyle Baltimore cuisine. Ahhhhh, the crabcake.

Now, if you're from Baltimore, if you grew up there eating Baltimore crabcakes at say CJs Crabhouse, the dish is pretty much ruined for you. What I mean is, you just can't order them anywhere else. Every once and a while the "crabcake" or some variant-there-of appears on a Toronto menu but it's always a bizarre bastardization. Apple & fennel crab-style cake; crab and corn fritter on spring greens; organic broiled crab mash with rosemary aioli...what is this bullshit? There is one way - one way only - to make a crabcake otherwise you might as well take a fist full of sawdust, dunk it in a dirty aquarium and call it a meal.

Oh, but just tell that to the smart-faced old Ukrainian at our local fishmonger's who tried to sell me clawmeat.

"Vhat are you try-eng to make vith zat?" he said when I pointed to the reasonably (and fairly) expensive can of lump.

"Crabcakes."

"Zats not vat you vant. Trust me. You vant zis. Much cheaper. But, hei, you are ze boss."

That's right, I am the boss. I am the goddess of crabcakes, old man, so back off. It's not like I was asking for a pound of primerib to boil for beefstew. Whatelse is lump crabmeat good for if not crabcakes? But how could he know. I've bought the "prepared" crabcakes they pawn off at their shop. You know what they taste like? A handful of sawdust dunked in a dirty aquarium.

I realize it's not always the case that one's beloved hometown food is superiour to other variants or is even good at all. Take another Baltimore favourite, the snowball. Now, I've tried - really tried - to get a few outsiders on the side of the 'ball, but everyone pretty much agrees, it's kindof a gross version of the snowcone. Now snowcones usually come in two flavours: red or blue (right, I know, those are colours, but in the world of sugar syrup, colour = flavour). Now the snowball, on the otherhand, comes in brilliant, creative flavours like "egg custard," or "skylite" or "tuttifrutti." These are flavours with meaning, with history. And, the snowball includes the option of marshmallow topping. Why would you want to take a 15 ounce soda-cup filled with crushed ice and sickly-sweet syrup and top it off with a big gooey heap of marshmallow? Why wouldn't you, I say. In fact, here is the expert way to order a snowball - if you happen to be passing through the Baltimore region this summer:

"I will have a medium chocolate (small= too much syrup, not enough ice; large = too much ice, not enough syrup) with marshmallow (obviously) in the middle and on top." If you just put the marshmallow on the top, you will inevitably eat it all off and the rest of the snowball is nothing but ice and flavouring - who wants that?! You need to hide a bit of marshmallow in the middle, really, to save yourself from yourself.

Ok. Truth be told, I can take about two bites of a chocolate & marshmallow snowball before wanting to hurl. But man, when I was 8, I could eat like 12 of them without blinking. My dad can still polish one off pretty impressively, but he's had many more years of practice and I've spent too many summers now away from home. Nostalgia is a dish best served cold. (It's just like watching Night Court...I'm sure you know what I mean).

There's no point trying to re-create the snowball here in Toronto, or really beyond a 20-mile radius of Reisterstown Road. It loses something out of context. But the crabcake is different. Look, Bloor West Ukrainian Fishmonger, this dish has been perfected by the hands of poor, easternshore crabpickers and passed on generation after generation, coffee-stained diner menu after diner menu. So even though your people probably ran through my people's shtetl with burning clubs and pig's blood oh so many years ago, I'm gonna tell you how it's done:

Lump crabmeat (honestly, lump it or leave it)

Mayo

Mustard (dry or wet, doesn't matter)

Old Bay Seasoning (Chesapeake, that is)

An egg

Maybe some salt and pepper

Only the smallest palmful of flour or breadcrumbs or bread soaked in milk

Mix (gently now, Petro, don't break up those precious lumps). Fridge. Mold. Broil/Fry.

Sure, you can add wasabi paste or green apple shavings or any other fancy-shmancy ingredient you want; you can make it with clawmeat or immitation crab or crab-flavoured tofu, but I repeat: sawdust, poopy-green aquarium, eat-it-up. You're wasting your time. Not that I'm some kindof culinary expert. Afterall, my kid ate a banana and croutons for dinner. So what do I know.

Tonight's Dinner:

Loki: 1 banana; approximately 8 croutons

Herb & Jessie: Edamame, Agadashi Tofu (Jessie), Dragon Roll, Spider Roll, BC Roll, Mixed sashimi (no surf clam, no octopus, substitute butterfish).

For Your Reading Pleasure:

A bit of Snowball history: http://www.citypaper.com/bob/story.asp?id=8153