Hairy Crab

Hairy crab (dazha xie — Chinese mitten crab) is the most celebrated seasonal delicacy of the Yangtze Delta and one of the few foods in Chinese cuisine that maintains a strict seasonal calendar observed by restaurants, food writers, and ordinary diners across the region. The season runs from approximately late September through November; eating hairy crab outside this window is considered pointless because the roe and hepatopancreas — the two components that justify the crab's reputation — are not fully developed at other times.

The crabs are small, typically between one hundred and two hundred grams, with the characteristic hairy claws that give them their name. They are farmed in lakes and waterways across the Yangtze Delta region, but the Yangcheng Lake (Yangcheng Hu) variety from the Suzhou area carries the most prestige and commands correspondingly higher prices. Counterfeit Yangcheng Lake crabs — crabs from other lakes passed off with Yangcheng Lake tags — are a recognised market problem during peak season.

Female crabs are eaten in the earlier part of the season for their orange roe (crab eggs), which accumulate in the body cavity and have a rich, dense, slightly sweet flavour. Male crabs are better later in the season when the hepatopancreas (crab paste, xiangao) — the yellowish-white digestive gland — has reached maximum richness. Both sexes are steamed whole for fifteen to twenty minutes, often on a bed of perilla leaves.

Eating hairy crab is unhurried and methodical. The standard sequence involves cracking the body, removing the apron, extracting the roe or paste from the shell with small picks and spoons from a crab-eating toolkit (a small purpose-made set), then working through the legs and claws. The dipping sauce is Chinkiang black vinegar (sometimes with shredded young ginger) and the traditional accompaniment is warm Shaoxing rice wine, which is said to counterbalance the cold nature of crab in traditional Chinese dietary thinking.

A crab meal for two typically involves four crabs and takes the better part of an hour.