The curiosities of food

by P. L. Simmonds

I select Browne’s account of the habits of the black or mountain crab, because he resided many years in Jamaica, and seems to have lost no opportunity of making personal observations; and his remarks tally with my own experience, from three years’ residence in Jamaica.

‘These creatures are very numerous in some parts of Jamaica, as well as in the neighbouring islands, and on the coast of the main continent; they are generally of a dark purple colour, but this often varies, and you frequently find them spotted, or entirely of another hue. They live chiefly on dry land, and at a considerable distance from the sea, which, however, they visit once a year to wash off their spawn, and afterwards return to the woods and higher lands, where they continue for the remaining part of the season; nor do the young ones ever fail to follow them, as soon as they are able to crawl. The old crabs generally regain their habitations in the mountains, which are seldom within less than a mile, and not often above three from the shore, by the latter end of June, and then provide themselves with convenient burrows, in which they pass the greatest part of the day, going out only at night to feed. In December and January they begin to be in spawn, and are then very fat and delicate, but continue to grow richer until the month of May, which is the season for them to wash off their eggs. They begin to move down in February, and are very much abroad in March and April, which seems to be the time for the impregnation of their eggs, being then frequently found fixed together; but the males, about this time, begin to lose their flavour and richness of their juices. The eggs are discharged from the body through two small round holes situated at the sides, and about the middle of the under shell; these are only large enough to admit one at a time, and as they pass they are entangled in the branched capillaments, with which the under side of the apron is copiously supplied, to which they stick by the means of their proper gluten, until the creatures reach the surf, where they wash them all off, and then they begin to return back again to the mountains. It is remarkable that the bag or stomach of this creature changes its juices with the state of the body; and while poor is full of a black, bitter, disagreeable fluid, which diminishes as it fattens, and at length acquires a delicate, rich flavour. About the month of July or August, the crabs fatten again and prepare for moulting, filling up their burrows with dry grass, leaves, and abundance of other materials: when the proper period comes, each retires to his hole, shuts up the passage, and remains quite inactive until he gets rid of his old shell, and is fully provided with a new one. How long they continue in this state is uncertain, but the shell is observed to burst, both at the back and sides, to give a passage to the body, and it extracts its limbs from all the other parts gradually afterwards. At this time, the fish is in the richest state, and covered only with a tender membraneous skin, variegated with a multitude of reddish veins; but this hardens gradually after, and becomes soon a perfect shell like the former; it is, however, remarkable, that during this change, there are some stony concretions always formed in the bag, which waste and dissolve gradually, as the creature forms and perfects its new crust. A wonderful mechanism! This crab runs very fast, and always endeavours to get into some hole or crevice on the approach of danger; nor does it wholly depend on its art and swiftness, for while it retreats it keeps both claws expanded, ready to catch the offender if he should come within its reach; and if it succeeds on these occasions, it commonly throws off the claw, which continues to squeeze with incredible force for near a minute after; while he, regardless of the loss, endeavours to make his escape, and to gain a more secure or a more lonely covert, contented to renew his limb with his coat at the ensuing change; nor would it grudge to lose many of the others to preserve the trunk entire, though each comes off with more labour and reluctance, as their numbers lessen.’

There are several varieties of land crabs, such as the large white, the mulatto, the black, and the red. The black and red crabs are most excellent eating: when in season, the females are full of a rich glutinous substance, called the eggs, which is perfectly delicious. Epicurean planters, in some of the West Indian Islands, have crab pens, (after the manner of fowl coops,) for fattening these luxuries. The best manner of dressing them is to pick out all the flesh from the shell, making it into a stew, with plenty of cayenne pepper, dishing it up in the shell; in this way they are little inferior to turtle. They are usually simply boiled, or roasted in the embers, by which they are deprived of their luscious flavour, and become not only insipid in taste but disgusting to look at.

In Dominica, they form an ingredient in the well-known ‘pepper-pot.’ The black crabs are also picked from their shell, stewed with Indian kale and pods of chilhies, and eaten with a pudding made of maize flour or rice; this dish is greatly esteemed by most of the inhabitants.

In the islands and cays of the Bahamas group, land crabs literally swarm, and afford food for the inhabitants the greatest part of the year: even the hogs are fed upon them. It is the grey or white kind of crab, common to Cuba and the Bahamas. In the autumn they are very fat, and equal in flavour to the black species of Jamaica. They are found in myriads in all parts, and thought a great delicacy; but a stranger tires of them in a few weeks.

The black crab is very fat and delicious; but the white and the mulatto crabs are sometimes dangerous, from feeding upon poisonous leaves and berries. To prevent any evil consequences, the flesh is washed with lime-juice and water.

Land crabs were probably plentiful in Italy, in the time of Virgil, for in his Fourth Georgic he forbids the roasting of red crabs near an apiary, the smell of them being disagreeable to the bees.

There is a species of fresh-water crab, the mason (Cancer cementarius), met with in Chile, the flesh of which is very white, and represented to be preferable to that of any other species of fluvial or marine crab. It is about eight inches long, of a brown colour, striped with red. They are found in abundance in almost all the rivers and brooks, on whose shores they build themselves, with clay, a small cylindrical tenement which rises six inches above the surface of the ground, but admits the water, by means of a subterranean canal extending to the bed of the river. They are easily caught, by letting down into the water a basket, or osier-pot, with a piece of meat in it.

That well-known crustacean, or ‘shell-fish’ as it is popularly termed,—the lobster (Astacus gammarus), although it is no fish at all, is found in great plenty about most of the European and American shores, and greatly esteemed as a very rich and nourishing aliment. In this country lobsters are considered in season from November till the end of April. They are not allowed to be caught on the coasts of Scotland between the 1st of June and the 1st of September, under a penalty of £5. Lobsters must not be offered for sale in this country under eight inches in length. Like the crab, the lobster casts its shell annually. It begins to breed in the spring, and continues breeding during the greater part of the summer. Lobsters are occasionally caught on the shores and in the neighbourhood of rocks, which they frequent, by the hand; but they are usually trapped in baskets, or pots made of osier-twigs, which are baited with garbage, and thrown into the sea, the situation being marked by a buoy of cork.

Lobsters are very abundant about Scilly and the Land’s End, and near Montrose in Scotland. In the Orkney and Shetland Islands, the value of the lobsters caught in 1833 was £1,800, which gave employment to 216 boats, and about 500 men. They are sent principally to Leith. Those caught near Heligoland are esteemed the most delicate. The largest fishery for these crustaceans is on the coasts of Norway, from whence we import more than a million a year. Upwards of half-a-million are caught on the shores of Scotland and Ireland. Lobsters are found almost everywhere on the North American coasts, and in the Bay of Chaleur, in such extraordinary numbers, that they are used by thousands to manure the land.