Picture of the Day: Emperor Crab with French Fries

Want fries with your spicy emperor crab dish at Sun Sui Wah?

Since I've been back to Vancouver I've had the opportunity to eat emperor crab five or six times, and savour every bite.

I do have to admit feeling terrible for the giant crustacean that is paraded to the guests before it is slaughtered for our benefit, but as omnivores we finish every bit of the crab in three ways.

Steamed crab legs with garlic and scallions

The legs are steamed with tons of minced garlic and a sprinkling of scallions on top, the leg joints are stir-fried or deep-fried, usually with a dash of spice, and then any leftover bits and the shell are made into a curry rice.

Another time the roe from the crab was made into a sauce mixed with a very thin noodle that was divine.

Last night we went to Sun Sui Wah on Main Street for another round of emperor crab to treat out-of-town guests and friends we hadn't seen in a while. You do need at least a dozen people to eat this dish, but we only had 11 people, and one was a child.

This time the crab was 9 pounds and the almost 7-year-old boy managed to hold it up! Impressive.

The first course was good, perhaps slightly overcooked, but nevertheless the meat was still sweet and succulent. 

Curry rice with crab meat and shell

And the last course of the curry rice -- but by this point we were so full that most of it was brought home.

However, our second course raised some eyebrows.

It was a spicy deep-fry of the leg joints -- with French fries????

How bizarre was that. We joked this was the restaurant's way of trying fusion, or inflation had caused the business to turn to French fries because noodles were too expensive.

Either way we were really surprised to see French fries with crab -- in a Chinese restaurant.

If you like spicy fries then it was fine, but the sauce was dry, not wet so it didn't seem like a good combination.

Interestingly we also had another "fusion" dish of beef cubes stir-fried with Brussels sprouts...