Gone Crabbing!

While on the Oregon Coast, we are attempting to do as the Oregonians do and went crabbing!

Walking around the cute little town of Florence Oregon, I was tempted to buy a cooked crab and eat it since we're on the coast and all. Then we learned how easy it is to catch your own crabs and thought we'd buy a crab trap at the local hardware store and go try our luck.

We filled our trap with mackerel and dropped it down into the water from a public pier. After watching all the other crabbers around us pull up so many crabs I couldn't wait to see what was in our trap!

Pulling up the trap!

When we pulled it up it was full of crabs!

Crabs in the trap but not big enough to keep.

None we big enough to keep but after pulling our trap up for the first time, I was addicted. We let the trap down again and checked it about 30 minutes later. We had a keeper the second time we pulled up the trap! (Dungenous Crabs must be male and at least 5 3/4 inches across it's shell in order to keep them.)

Big Man Crab

We let the trap down a few more times at our first location but didn't get anymore big guys. We moved to a new location and let our trap down twice before landing another big crab. After that, we took them home to cook them.

While on the dock at our first fishing location we met an Italian man that cleaned a crab alive in front of us so we could learn "the best way" (according to him) to clean and eat crab. He liked to clean the crab first then cook it because you don't have all the crab inards to deal with after it's been boiled and he swore it tasted better to cook it without the shell and insides, just the legs.

I can't fit a whole crab in my cooking pot since I only have one medium sized pot so, I had not choice but to clean our crabs first since they would be much smaller once their shell was gone. I'm glad I'd had a lesson in crab cleaning earlier in the day. Let's just say I feel like one tough person after cleaning a live crab.

Our Cooking Station Outside

I'm totally addicted to crabbing now! I will be crabbing and cooking crab as we travel up the coast for the next few weeks for sure! It's just so amazing to me that you can simply drop a crab trap down and when you lift it up again you'll potentially have a delicious crab that you can eat! Have you ever been crabbing? 

Et Voila!