[a_techwriter_00]

My father's family have been in Maryland since the 1600s. When my father made fried chicken, he made it with lard, a seasoned breading, and a milk gravy, somewhat like country fried steak. But he never billed it as "Maryland fried chicken" or conveyed any sense of "this is how ~we Marylanders~ do it" whereas with other things, like crab cakes, there was definitely a sense of This Is How We Do It Here And Those People In Virginia Can Go To Hell.

[fbdab103]

What would be the key attribute that makes or breaks a crab cake? That is, what distinguishes a Maryland vs Virginia crab cake?

[a_techwriter_00]

He insisted on saltine crackers for the breadcrumbs and Old Bay seasoning in particular. (Old Bay is known enough now that I've seen it in random parts of the country and even overseas, but I suppose back in the day it was a lot more of a local thing. Personally, I can't tell the difference between the saltines and just making the breadcrumbs with bread that's a bit stale.)

edit: Also it goes without saying that an MD crab cake is blue crab. I think VA crab cakes would be blue crab too, but out west I've had Dungeness crab cakes and they aren't bad but it's not the same.

[kuhewa]

Old Bay for anything besides steamed hard crabs, for the boil J.O.'s is the seasoning you want.

[kuhewa]

In general the use of a shitload of breadcrumb or other filler will break a crabcake. Should just be a very light mayo based binder just to hold it together, and the lump of the crab meat should still be intact. I worked as a teen at one of the famous crab houses on the bay, they used really light mayo with the crab but then after weighing packed saltine crumbs around the outside tightly until it formed a ball, and then was fried. My grandfather, who was a chicken necker, did not use breading at all and shallow fried his crab cakes.