On Trinidad's sister Island, Tobago,
everyone's essential beach treat is "crab and dumplings,"
and Miss Trim's, in Storebay, is the place to indulge.
Here we find a plate of curried crab atop a large, flat, oblong dumpling that is there to sop up some of the curried gravy.
It's a perfect Creole dish: the curry is Indian, the crab comes from local waters, and the dense flour dumpling adds the African touch.
Chef Debra Sardinha-Metivier shows us how to make it at home....
Today we're going to focus a little bit on the Tobago side of our cuisine, and we're doing
a very traditional curry crab and dumpling.
The dumpling does not have any raising agent in it, so it's just basically flour and salt.
And there's a little bit of a kick or tradition with our Tobago.
Left-hand dumpling, so they say, when the woman makes it with the left hand, kneads the dumpling, the man is not going anywhere.
But we're not going to do that to you today, we're going to just make it very traditional, with both hands.
So we start off with a little bit of all-purpose flour. Just a pinch of salt.
Now, we're going to add enough water to, sort of, bring it in, allow it to come in nicely. Now we're going to knead it a little bit.
Now, for me, I like small dumplings. I guess, being a lady, a little more delicate, but traditionally, our dumplings are quite large.
Very filling.
And the dough is actually tight. Not a lot of liquid.
You want it to sort of come in....
in a very tight manner, so that when it is put in boiling salted water, and it floats up to the top, it tells us that it's done....
And basically, it has - you want to see a little bit of a texture and bite to it.
If you add too much liquid, what happens is that you get a softer dumpling,
which is what I personally like. But since we're doing traditional today, we're going to do it the right way, so you're going to get a little bite in these dumplings.
I'm going to add just a little bit more water - just a sprinkling.
I'm going to turn it out, to kind of knead it. Bring it in.
And notice I'm using both hands.
You just want to... kind of... You're not going to over-knead it,
but you want to be able to ensure that all the flour or the dry flour has been incorporated,
it's a little bit of elasticity going on, are we going to let that sit for a while and rest, as we say.
And I'm just going to cover with a cloth and just allow it to rest a little bit.
Now we're going to talk a little bit about our curry.
This is our blue crab - land crab. It's normally found the borderlines in the mangrove which is basically between the river mouth and the sea.
And it's - it gets its name, "blue crab," obviously by the color. Which is really a traditional blue.
Very sweet meat. Takes a little time to to get to it, but with the effort, um....
I guess some people, depending.... For us, culturally, it's worth the effort, but then you do have some people say,
"After all of that hard work, you know, there's such such a small amount of crab!" as opposed to when you have a crab cake with lump crab.
But this is very traditional, so we're going down that route.
Okay, so we've already basically taken off the back, washed it, you take a little scrubbing brush and scrub all in between. Because, again,
the borderline of where it lives.... To make sure that it's it's pretty much very clean.
And I would say traditionally, in my grandmother's day, basically we would buy crabs,
put them in a cage, and feed them and allow them to purge themselves. Give them
bananas and fruit, and give them a good two weeks, and allow them to really cleanse themselves.
So, that - as well - does not always happen in today's world, but that was a tradition - how that was done.
Now, the main thing with this curry crab - is not so much the crab - but actually the curry.
We are using Madras Curry, and it's very important for us, when we're cooking our curry, to ensure that we...
What we say - we *cook* the curry, so the curry has to be combined with a little bit of liquid. And in this case, I'm going to use a little bit of water.
And we're going to make a slurry.
So, we're just mixing the curry and water together .....
And setting it aside for a little bit, so that the starches...it's.... sort of, you know.... I guess pull a little bit on the liquid.
And in the meantime.....
I'm going to use flavoring pepper - two of them.
Some white onions.
Some...A little bit of cilantro. A little bit of ginger. And some garlic.
We're going to just mince our ginger a little bit.
[Grating sound]
Our flavoring pepper is a pepper on the island that, really is.... I'm going to say, it's very soft in terms of heat.
But it really gives..... It's the base for a lot of the Creole dishes.
It gives it a very distinct [flavor], particularly in stews. It's used when we do our traditional breakfast dish,
which is a salt cod salad, or Buljol, as we call it. So, it's also used in Accra,
in many, many, many of our dishes. It gives a nice flavor without the heat. So, I'm going to just
cut it up a little bit.
And if we're using....Let's say doing mass, we basically would throw everything in a food processor.
I think sometimes, however, it alters the flavor a little bit. So, I like to traditionally cut it by hand.
So, we're just mincing it a little bit, because as the curry cooks, it's going to break it down.
And if you notice, I put seeds and everything. Okay.
Also going to dice up some onion.
And then we're also going to add a little bit of our Chadon Beni, which is a very....um.... it's similar
to Culantro, and basically gives that little extra depth to the curry dishes and relishes.
The other thing that I did not say is that, in our crab,
sometimes you... *not* sometimes, *most* times, you would season the crab like you would season your chicken or what not. And again,
the base for us is this green seasoning mixture, which is a combination of a very broad leaf thyme,
some onions, garlic, and the sweet pepper - and the pimento.
So, I'm going to just put a little bit.
It's similar to sofrito except sofrito has - I want to say - a little bit of a more.... More of a watery body to it....
It's a little bit greener as well. And the actual peppers that they use are a little bit sweeter.
You really don't get this.... our flavoring pepper has a very distinct flavor,
and sometimes - dependent on where it's grown, in the conditions - it can have a little bit of a kick of heat to it.
Right? So, we're just basically letting that marinate for a little bit.
And we're going to start our curry!
Okay, so I'm going to add a little bit of oil.
Now, in the islands - particularly Trinidad and Tobago - and on our island in particular....
We have two main groups that represent the cuisine. There are other groups, as well, that
have contributed, but the *two main groups* to the island are the African and the Indian.
And from the Indian, obviously, we get a lot of curries and you get a lot of chutneys, and different fritters,
some vegetarian items. And from the African, we get the provision and the staples and the beans. We
also have the Asian influence, you also have the Syrian-Lebanese, you also have Spanish....
So there are lots of things running through. But two main groups that contribute would be:
the African and the Indian. This curry that we tend to use in Trinidad is called Madras Curry.
So it has a very distinct flavor. It's basically the base for most of the curry dishes that you
would have, with your Roti or side of curry chicken.
We also have a slightly more intense curry that's a little bit darker with Amchar Massala.
And that's for like, when we do curry goat and curry duck.
Okay, so we're going to start off. I'm going to put a little bit of garlic.
Notice I said, "little."
My ginger, my pepper,
and my Chadon Beni.
And.....
some Geera, or cumin seeds. Allow that to toast into the curry.
Traditionally, you probably would grind it up, but I do like the flavor that comes from the slow release of the geera, or cumin, as you would know it.
Letting those oils come together nicely.
Okay, so to this now, I'm going to add the curry.
And if you notice, it's sort of what we would say - it's swollen, it has swelled up, it has sort of absorbed some of that liquid.
And I'm also going to add a little turmeric powder to it.
And we're cooking the curry. We're chunking the curry. Which allows the......
....We're getting that nice curry smell coming out of it.
Gonna add a little bit of oil. Just to allow it to fry a little bit.
And I'm going to finish with a little bit of fish stock.
This we're going to allow to simmer for at least half an hour. You really want those granules to
take its time. You want all those flavors to come together nicely. It really doesn't
take very long for the crab to cook. Basically what tends to happen is - with the crab, you're
looking at about 10 minutes... 10, 15 minutes....
So it's really important that this foundation is cooked well and is full of flavor.
So you're going to let this do its thing. And I'm going to finish with a little bit of coconut milk to it
Allow this to simmer for a little bit and then I'm going to adjust the flavors with the salt and pepper.
And! Just to put a little umfff, we're not going to... we're not going to let it open up.... but we're just letting it simmer in the pot:
A little hot pepper or scotch bonnet. Just let that kind of mellow in the flavor. Okay?
We're going to let this simmer for, as I said before, about 20 minutes.
Okay, so now we're going to continue with our crab and dumpling. We're going to focus on the dumpling.
We've allowed it to rest for a little while, so it's, you know - it's kind of relaxed.
Cutting it.
I'm just going to make it into a little bit of a ball.
So, put it in the palm of your hand, and you just basically bring in the edges.
Kind of a slight turn or twist as you are....
We're going to do this part, and then we're gonna allow it t rest for another ten minutes, before we roll it out.
And while it's resting, we're going to continue with the crab. Because the curry would have been cooked.
Okay, so we're letting that rest and we're going to deal with our blue crab now.
So, our curry sauce has been simmering for the last 25 minutes.
Curry granules would have cooked nicely. We added a little more coconut milk and fish stock to it while it was boiling,
and now we're just going to add in our crab and allow it to cook in that sauce.
We're going to roll out one or two smaller dumplings and put it in as well,
so that the sauce would be thickened by the dumplings. Just a little bit, not too much.
[Sound of thongs hitting pot]
Making sure that I don't interfere too much with my pepper.
And I want to get a little bit of this green seasoning in it, as well.
All right. And we're going to cover it and lower to simmer for a couple of minutes, as well.
Very little flour, if you notice.
And again, because it's very little liquid, I know it's what I would call - a little bit "tighter" than I would personally prefer it.
So I'm rolling it a little thinner, because it is going to give us a nice bite.
Now, the ones that are going to go into the actual curry, to give it a little bit of thickening,
we're going to roll it out smaller. So we're rolling it out lengthways and we're
cutting it up in tiny little knots.
Because the idea behind it is - just basically - it's used to assist us in thickening the sauce a little bit.
So, you're just taking a knife. I like to cut them really small, so that everybody gets a little bit.
I'm going to add this to the pot.
So, we're putting it in in between, so it thickens up nicely.
Right. And the others.... put it into water. And add a little salt.
And you're going to know when they're done, because they're basically going to just come up to the top.
[Sound of thongs hitting pot]
Smells really good.
And if you notice, you see the dumplings are literally coming up to the top now. That's an
indication that they're pretty much ready to to be plated.
Okay, so now that we finishing, we're going to add just a little, little, little bit of sugar.
And a little bit of fresh lime juice. Just to give it a little balance.
Stir it around a little bit.
And you can see that, by adding those mini dumplings, the sauce is thickened. Not too much, but just enough, where everything is coming together nicely.
I'm really getting a nice smell coming out of it now.
And our dumplings are more than ready, so we're going to strain that off.
So three nice dumplings.
Curry crab and dumpling would be, I would say, the traditional - one of the main traditional dishes - in Tobago.
In Trinidad, although you would see a crab being sold in the market, it probably would go more
towards callaloo on a Sunday.
And the odd person would make it. But Tobago is really known for the curry crab and dumpling.
So we're going to put a nice amount of sauce.
And we're going to finish off with a couple of serious crabs.
And there you have it. Curry crab and dumpling.