Miami · Served at Joe’s since 1921
Florida stone crab claws
Claws cracked and served cold with a mustard sauce, from a crab that regrows what it gives. Miami’s only true native dish, in season from October to May.
The wine
A Chablis or a dry Riesling; the mustard sauce wants freshness, and a Champagne is the Miami way.
The stone crab is a Florida miracle: fishermen take one claw and return the crab to the water, where it regrows the claw within a year. The claws are cooked on the boat and served cold, cracked with a mallet, with a mustard-mayonnaise sauce that Joe’s Stone Crab on Miami Beach has served since Jesse Weiss started selling claws in 1921. The season runs from mid-October to early May, and the city marks the opening like a holiday.
Joe’s remains the temple, with its white-jacketed waiters, hash browns, coleslaw and key lime pie, but the claws have entered Miami’s new kitchens too: Michael Beltran serves them at Ariete in season, and every seafood counter in the city has a mallet on the bar.
At home the claws arrive cooked; the work is cracking them cleanly without shattering the shell into the meat, and making the sauce: mayonnaise, dry mustard, Worcestershire, a little cream and lemon. Serve cold with lemon and, if you want to be authentic, hash browns.
The home recipe · Serves 4
Ingredients
- 1.5 kg cooked stone crab claws, chilled
- Mustard sauce: 200 g mayonnaise, 1 tablespoon dry mustard, 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce, 2 tablespoons cream, lemon juice, salt
- Lemon wedges
- Crushed ice
Method
- Whisk the mustard sauce ingredients together and chill for an hour.
- Crack each claw with a mallet or the back of a heavy spoon at the knuckle and along the shell, keeping the meat whole.
- Arrange on crushed ice with the sauce and lemon.
- Serve cold, with hash browns and coleslaw for the full Miami version.
Where to eat it
