Today, I would like to introduce you a local dish that is known to all rural kids who grew up in countryside. It is called សម្លម្ជូបុកក្តាម Crab sour soup.
I have no idea whether you have eaten paddy field crabs, but I assure you that this one is of the best childhood food, mom cooks it the best.
At the beginning of rainy season, when the rain starts to drop, there are fish and crabs start getting life and if you get crabs at this time, it tastes the best! Crabs can be threats to rice if there are too much of them - they will cut the paddy in the field. This soup is just one way to eat crabs. There are more ways we cook tasty crabs! I am going to bring you all to cook with me now. Before cooking, we need to prepare ingredients and prepare the crab. So, there are two steps into cooking this.
Prep Time: 3****0 minutes
Cook Time: 2****0 minutes
Total Time: 50 minutes
Course: Main dish with rice!
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Description
How to do it!
1
Ingredients
Meat:
- 0.5kgs of paddy field crabs, with or without small fish
Vegetable
- Best to have taro leaves to go with crab, if not, then a small fruit of wax gourd/winter melon or gourd (clean and cut them small like finger size)
Spices
- 2tbs of salt - 1.5tbs of fermented fish - 1 tbsp powder soup / MSG (if you use it) - 1 tsp of palm sugar - 2krams of tamarind leaves (clean and cut into small pieces) - 2tbs of paddy herbs (clean, cut small pieces)
2
Prepare crab
- Clean crab, separate its shells and belly.
- Keep the back shells aside - The belly need to take out its lung and belly shells. - Pound the crab belly well into the mortar. - Use about 0.75liters of water to mix with the pounded crab, the idea is to get its taste through the flesh only by using the filter to separate juice from the shells (Please note that since paddy field crab is small so it is not easy to get its flesh, pounding them and use the juice from is the only way) where the remaining shell will be threw away. In order to get all juice from the shell, you have to repeat the filting few times until the shells have no flesh less. - Keep the juice aside (which will be used for the soup). The shells less from filtering have to be thrown away.
3
Instructions on how to cook
- Boil 1.25liters of water, add salt (If you use fish too, put them now) - When boiling, put fermented fish in - Then, put wax gourd, wait for it to get boiling - Put tamarind leaves, put the back shells of the crabs in - Pour the crab juice in the soup, just 1-2mns only as the water boiling, hurry to take the soup pot off the stove (keep longer, the crab will be tasteless and spoil the whole soup as it starts to smell not so good) - Add paddy field herbs and chili (if you prefer) - It is ready to dig in!
This dish, you might be able to order from the restaurants but I don’t think there are so much available. It is more family food and whenever you show it to local people, they would say oh they miss it and they love it. Not many people know how to cook this dish properly. My younger sisters cannot cook it. Some people don’t even know which part of the crab we are using. Luckily, I learnt it from my mom as a kid, I often saw her cooked this and the taste was beyond amazing.
Looks so yummy and mouth watering Crab soup dear! In foreign country I eat similar food!, But in Bangladesh it is not familiar, as many Muslim people avoid it,
Anyway thank you so much for your sharing with us a so beautiful recipe with nice photos , So well written post too!
Have a nice day my dear!
By the way, I already changed my cover photo of recent travel post , Do you like it? or you think older one was beautiful.
Ah, is it a taboo for Muslim @MAHBUB_HYDER ? This one is kind of hidden dish that not everyone can have it. Crab from countryside in the paddy fields are clean so I assume it is safe to eat them.
I saw the cover but haven’t really checked it, will see later!
Very nice dish and recipe, never seen nor tried as well, so I’m learning something new again, but it looks like very delicious. I love seafood and love crabs so I’m sure I’ll love this dish as well, btw curious how it tastes!
Childhood recipes are always the best and it is a very lucky thing being able to keep them, I agree with you that same dishes in restaurants won’t be the same .
I bet you don’t have paddy field crabs at home @LuigiZ yes, as much as seafood, this one is equally tasty. It is hot, sour and with great aroma. I don’t know how to explain but if you are ever here in Cambodia, we will find out. I’m happy to introduce you to many hidden treasure !
Oh no @Sophia_Cambodia ! Now I see what you mean, paddy is a rice field, so crabs growing into the rice field? I thought they were sea sand crabs cooked with rice LOL … you can see that I’ve never heard about “paddy field crab”, and I’m even more curious to see what they look like compared to sea crabs which are used over here.
Be sure that if I should be anytime in Cambodia once I’ll for sure ask to try something of all what you show us here .
You had it @TusharSuradkar wow where did you have such dish? Well, like you said it is so mouth watering. Well, the flavor from juice alone is incredible that you don’t need to put more meat. My siblings were like: wow this tastes like mom’s! Last night it rained the whole night so crabs go out and play with the rain while human catch them for food. It tastes light but tasty…
I have never tasted crab @Sophia_Cambodia But I think I will love eating fried crab. Your soup looks delicious. As we do not eat crab normally, so I may not like to take the taste of this healthy soup. Thanks for tagging me to this nice post. Stay safe friend.
I understand @MukulR one’s delicacy doesn’t have to be it for another one. We have different opinions on food depends on where we live. And we have perceived it since growing up.
Due to some religious restrictions we do not eat/drink something e.g pork, alcohol etc. Due to cultural and habitual matter, we do not eat/drink something that is eaten by other nation. Thanks for your nice comments and understanding @Sophia_Cambodia . Stay safe.
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… you can see that I’ve never heard about “paddy field crab”, and I’m even more curious to see what they look like compared to sea crabs which are used over here.
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