Breakfast For Dinner: Crab Cake Benedict | Dinner DeeAs

Breakfast for dinner. It's not just for the lazy or the jet lag. Today, we have the how-to ultimate guide to the perfect eggs benedict. We're talking perfect poached eggs, a silky homemade hollandaise sauce, plus crispy crab cakes, and a fried green update in place of the meh muffins. So whether you have it for breakfast, brunch, or dinner, this is a recipe you have to try. It's ahead on Dinner Dears. Welcome to the kitchen. I'm Angie Corley, and my guest today takes her seafood seriously. Chef Shelby Farrell runs the kitchen at Tampa's Oyster Catches with the menu celebrating those southern flavors, locally sourced ingredients. So who better to give us a masterclass on a classic dish? Shelby, welcome. So glad to have you here, chef. This is gonna be so good. Excited to be here. Doing some fried green tomatoes, too. All my favorites and my roots are coming out in this dish today. So I'm ready. Get ready, because chef Shelby is here to share her secrets for the ultimate eggs benedict, plus a little twist or two. Gonna throw it in there. Yes, you are going to learn how she does it, a perfect poached eggs and her hollandaise sauce. But we're also serving it up with some homemade crab cakes and on fried green tomatoes in place of that traditional English muffin. Yeah, so what's your inspiration for that? Because that's like, I'm all in for that one. Well, I grew up on the Gulf Coast, Florida. My family's all from coastal Mississippi. So, you know, anytime I can kind of squeeze that Southern flair into a dish, I love it. You know, like you said, English muffin, passe. Yes, right. Fried green tomatoes, we're all in. All right, so let's talk about all in. I see some butter going. We're starting with, I guess, the hollandaise sauce. Yeah, so I wanted to make a hollandaise in the blender. A lot of times people get scared of that double boiler situation. That's me. Something about it just sounds intimidating. So we're going to make it in a blender today. A little bit easier. Okay, I'm taking notes. We got our notes on dinner dish. All right, where do we start? So we started right here with just a melted butter. All we've done is melt it and just cook it at a simmer until most of the water has boiled off and separated. So butter's three parts. You got your fat solids, you got your fat and you got your water. So now most of our water's cooked off. And that's the white kind of, I say film, but it's not film, it's just the- That's the fat solids. That's the fat. So we've got our water's cooked off at this point. And right now we're just going to take a spoon, like you're ladling the fat off the top of a soup. No fat, huh? Mm-hmm, well, fat solids, fat, you know. Fat solids, yeah. Is that the clarified butter that's left? Exactly, exactly. So this is just clarified butter. And you know, these days, I think you can even buy clarified butter at the grocery store. A lot of times you see it labeled as ghee. Ghee. Which is just a fermented- G-H-E-E, right? Yes. So- But why not do it at home? Exactly, it ain't that hard. Salted, unsalted butter? This is unsalted, but you can do it with salted. Okay, okay. Yeah, absolutely. So a little bit of- I would have thought that it would have burnt. You know, to melt the butter, when I try to do eggs real quick, it's like, oh, the butter burned. But you did it, and again, I love how you're showing us how the water, the butter, and those fat solids just kind of separate, and you just scoop it off. Exactly. Easy. So this is mostly clarified at this point. Like I said, you got a little bit of that fat that's stuck to the bottom, but it's gonna stay there. Doesn't matter? Yep, and all of our water's already cooked off. Well, all right. Okay, now we're gonna put it all together. Exactly. Okay. Yep, so we're gonna start with three egg yolks, separated, no whites. Okay. That's gonna give it that nice creamy texture and bind everything together. A little Dijon. Always yummy. Which is gonna help bind the fat of the butter into the egg yolk. Okay. We've got, this is a Zab's hot sauce. Zab's? I've never heard of Zab's. I love them. They're a St. Augustine-based company, and they make their hot sauce with the datil pepper, which is Florida's only native hot pepper. Datil. Mm-hmm. Datil on. Exactly. Datil pepper. Any kind of like slightly sweet hot sauce can be substituted for that, though. Okay. Right here. And what is that? That's gorgeous in color. Beautiful orange. This is Zatarain's, so it's just Southern Old Bay. That's exactly what it is. Yep, so I just came from New Orleans. I love my Zatarain's. You know, I love taking, like I said, those flavors kind of of the South of growing up and mixing them into the classics. And these are, everything you have here is pretty easy to find. This is just commercial-grade hot sauce? Yeah, exactly. Yep. Fresh lemon juice. Yes. All righty, and we are going to blend this up. And then, if you don't mind handing me, we're gonna add a little warm water. So this is kind of your trick. Instead of doing the double boiler, this is just kind of gonna start cooking that egg yolk a bit. Oh! Now, what are we looking for as we kind of mix just a little bit of water in with our coming soon hollandaise sauce here? I'm looking for the yolk to get a little bit lighter in color. Okay. And just to have everything completely combined. Oh! So just a splash, and that's just really gonna help us make sure that we have the right texture at the end of all this. Okay. Now, how many, I see a lot of butter. Do we use all of the butter that's in the pan, or do you just do it until it gets the right consistency or color? To the right consistency, yeah. So about a half a cup for the few egg yolks we got here. That looks beautiful. I'm telling you, you're making it look so easy. Everything is in the blender. Once we're done with the sauce, can we use it again, or do we make it and eat it right away? It has to be eaten right away. Okay. You can't refrigerate hollandaise. Oh, good to know. It'll basically just turn into a big old lump. We don't want that. Nope. Okay. So you can see it's starting to get real light in color. Yes. You can hear how thick it's getting, right? Will you just thin it out with a little butter? The butter will actually keep making it thicker. But that's what we want at this point. You want a nice, thick, substantial sauce. You want it nice and creamy. Can you look at the texture through it to see? Yeah, so take this little lid off, and I'm gonna turn this off. I love that. Give it a try. So you can see you got a nice, thick texture to it. Oh, well, you know, you know. That's it. I gotta just see what you're working with here, chef. Please do. Okay. Oh, my God. That is warm and smooth and silky. That is wonderful. Thank you. The taste is perfect. It's not hot because you put the hot sauce. I don't taste the pepper, but lemon is bright and beautiful. Love the Dijon, a little bit of spice. That is dynamic. I guess it's time for a break. I'm gonna put my spoon back in. I'll get a fresh one. Let's take a little break. We're gonna get everything warmed up. We're getting started in the kitchen. We'll be back in a minute. Chef Shelby is gonna show us how to pack maximum kind of coastal flavors into the ultimate crispy crab cake. That's ahead on Dinner Deon. So we're remixing mealtime today with a breakfast or maybe it's a brunch idea. Yes, you could totally have this for dinner. We're talking Eggs Benedict, but with a few surprises. Crab cakes, which we're about to make in a second in place of like bacon, right? I love this. And get this, fried green tomatoes instead of muffins. Yes, and that's all thanks to this lovely super chef, Shelby Farrell from Oyster Catchers, which is in the Grand Hyatt right over the Courtney Campbell. Yes, ma'am. I have been there. I love it. I'm so glad brunch is finally back. I can say me and my friends, we've had some girl time fun there, but you went away a little bit during COVID. Yeah, we did. Yeah, from COVID up until February this year. And so we finally brought her back every single Sunday. Yes, it is out of sight. So just you wait. But listen, before the break, Chef Shelby showed us how to bypass the stress of making a traditional hollandaise sauce by doing it in the blender. Easy, easy. First, melting some butter, then skimming off the solids and blending the egg yolks, the Dijon mustard, a little hot sauce, some crab boil powder, lemon juice, hot water, carefully drizzling in the melted butter in the blender. You kept it running and then voila, delicioso. It was fabulous. So now it's time to talk about these crab cakes, which I see us going lump, jumbo, can, what do we do with the crab? How do we find that? So, I mean, you can find crab meat at pretty much any grocery store these days, but I think we all know lump crab meat is crazy. It is really. Because they do all the hard work. They do, they do all the work for you. And it is, you know, it's just the most highly prized little morsel out of every piece of crab meat or out of every piece of crab. So today we're actually gonna be making this with crab claw meat. Love that. It's about a quarter of the price of lump crab. Right on. And honestly, for a crab cake, I prefer it. It's got a lot of flavor without being fishy, you know, and I just, you know, I think it's a great product and a good way to save a buck on making a crab cake. That's smart. We could have it more. Yeah, exactly. So we're gonna start off with just some good quality mayo. Okay. Got a few of those same ingredients we used last time. We got that Zab's hot sauce. Again, whatever hot sauce you prefer is fine. Just gives it a nice little something something. Yeah, a little dip. I'm sure they blend with that hollandaise sauce that you used. Exactly, so you're kind of pulling those same flavors in. One fresh egg, that's gonna help as this cooks to really bind it all together. Okay. Again, a little bit of that crab oil, that Zatarain's. Give us our salt. And just a spritz of fresh lemon juice. That's easy. Easy peasy. Okay. All right, and we're gonna just whisk this until our egg is completely mixed in with our mayo. I'm sure you know the number one complaint people say about crab cakes, when they go to certain places or they make them at home, it's too much bread. We love all that crab meat, all that goodness meat together. So I can't wait to see how you put this and combine it all together and how really easy it is to just mix it up. Exactly. Like I said, the goal is just enough other ingredients to make it stick together. Not a bit more. So again, we're taking that mayo mix we just made. How do you? About a half a cup of bread crumb. To a whole, so this is a pound of crab meat here. That looks great. And then we're just gonna take. Get your hands dirty. Yeah. Go all in. Fresh, take some gloved hands. And I always like to tell people, soft hands. Just really loosely toss this together. Oh, is that so you don't break it up? Yeah, yeah, because you know, you paid good money for this crab meat. You don't want it all shredded and mixed in so you can't tell that from the rest of it. So really, that's it. So you're just gonna. Am I gonna grab some? Yeah, come in here with me. Okay. So just kind of grab a palm-sized little lump and it's like, just like making a meatball, right? So first you're gonna press that air out. Oh. And you can kind of feel those little bubbles popping, right? So once that feels nice and firm. Don't squish it, don't break it up, because I like those little lumps. Uh-huh, and then you're just gonna pat it out. Hi, little baby. Cute. And that's your crab cake. Oh, easy peasy. Oh, I love that. Okay. I wanna eat my meat. My glove's here. So I see we have our skillet getting nice. Do you need any more gloves, Steph? Oh, no, I'm all good. You're good? Okay. So yeah, we got a nice, like, mid-high. You wanna flip so you can get in there? Sure, that'd be great. Appreciate ya. Okay. So a little bit of oil down. Whatever, neutral oil, canola's good. Okay. And then. Oh, nice sizzling pan. And because the crab meat is cooked, if you will, how long do these actually take? So really, you just are looking to cook the egg that we mix into this, but as soon as it's hot in the center, it's gonna be done. So we're gonna just get this golden brown on both sides. Once it's hot, it's cooked. I smell it already. Don't go anywhere, friends. When we return, we're gonna poach the perfect eggs, frying up some of those gorgeous fried green tomatoes. It's gonna wait completely over the top. This is it, and it's ahead on Dinner Dears. Hi, this is Dinner Dears. But listen, don't tell anyone, but today's recipe is kind of like a breakfast, but we checked, and legally, you can have this for dinner. Let them try and stop you. Hey, on our menu, we have Eggs Benedict, done perfectly, deliciously with these crab cakes, fried green tomatoes, and a recipe from my guest, Chef Shelby Farrell from Oyster Catchers in Tampa. Oh, girl, this is gonna be so good. Here's what we did a little earlier, if you're just joining us, our ridiculously easy hollandaise sauce. And before the break, we did the crab cakes, draining the water from the can, mixing it together with that mayo, egg, hot sauce, lemon juice, added the crab meat, along with a little bit of fresh breadcrumbs, and then we portioned them off, perfect little ball, searing them for a couple of minutes on each side, and we are at our next step, one of my favorite things, fried green tomatoes. We are marinating over here, buttermilk. Yes, absolutely. I feel like the buttermilk is underutilized. It is, you know, it's gonna give it a little bit of tang, it's gonna help that breading stick, you know, it's just another extra little layer of flavor. All right, so you gave me the gloves, chef, so I'm gonna make sure it's well coated, nice little thickness here, and then I'm gonna go right down the line? Yep, right down the line, right into that flour, same thing, toss it. Now, when you take that out, kind of try to pat off that extra, there you go, perfect. All right, pat, pat. So we always like to say wet hand, dry hand, so now with your other hand, why don't you put that in, drop it in, yep, now you can take that hand, uh-huh, and swirl it around, uh-huh, swirl it around, yep, there you go, uh-huh, pull it out, shake her off, into here, shake it off, uh-huh, and if you see that little bit of dry spot like you got right there, dip your finger in there and kind of just paint it. Oh, look at that, it repairs on its own, okay, there we go. Yep, all right, and now with your dry hand, you're gonna cover that up, perfect, perfect. What's in here with the breadcrumbs? Oh, yeah, so this is just panko and cornmeal. Okay. Yep, cornmeal's classic for doing your fried green tomatoes, but panko's gonna help give it a little extra crunch. Mm, I love that, and then in the oil we go? Yeah, straight in the oil, about 350. Oh, yeah, all right, now it's time to repeat. Yep, rinse and repeat. I'm gonna repeat, so I'm gonna do a little shake. Absolutely. All right, while I do this, it's time for your fun, the poached egg, the moment we've been waiting for. I've always wanted to learn how to do this. So into our water, we're just gonna take a little bit of vinegar. Vinegar's gonna help that egg white from spreading out too much and really help hold the shape. Another little trick I like to do is I crack my egg into a little sifter. That's cute. So that's gonna help, that's gonna help take the more watery, broken down part of the egg white. And just let that separate right off, right? So most of your egg white's still gonna stick, but you won't have so much of that floating around. Yes, all the little nuggets, the egg pieces. So into our vinegar water. So you do a little swirly, swirly. Little swirl, make a little vortex. Nothing too fast, and we're just gonna go right in the middle. It did it on its own. Yep, and so... And I see you're doing a little extra swirl. Do we just keep moving it till it forms a shape? I'm just gonna, yeah, I'm just gonna, I don't want it to stick to the bottom. And I got the memo. There you go. How long does that take? On these fried greens or? Or the potage? About three minutes. That's it? Yep. Depends on how fully cooked you like your yolk to be. So you can just kind of keep swirling. Yeah, so, I mean, at this point, it's got the shape that it's gonna take. What I can do now that I've got a little bit more, it's more set, is that I can drop a second egg in it. So again, we're gonna crack. I think our fried green tomatoes are looking great. I did a little flip to get them that golden brown. Tell me how that looks, Chef. Those look great. Honestly, yeah, those ones that are getting a little darker, you can go ahead and, ooh, shoot. Take those out. And we can take those out. I'll take these out. We'll take a little break. We're gonna finish everything off. Layer it all together. One last break. When we come back, Chef Shelby is gonna show us how she stacks it all up for the ultimate eggs benedict. That's ahead on Dinner Diaz. This is Dinner Diaz, where we're learning the secrets of a fancy brunch today from Chef Shelby Farrell. She oversees the lunch and the dinner, and now Sunday brunch yet is back at Oyster Catchers in Tampa. Delish, one of my faves. She's here to tell us and share her take on eggs benedict served with crab cakes, yum, sitting on top of mouth-watering fried green tomato. Oh my goodness, here's a little recap, y'all. Okay, we're about to get this all plated up, but here, let me catch you up. Catch up, get it, with Oyster Catchers. Okay, anyway, I'm corny. First, we made these gorgeous fried green tomatoes, marinating the slices in buttermilk, then coating them in flour, egg, a little bit of cornmeal mixture with some panko and a little bit of salt, frying them until they are golden brown on both sides. After that, we learned how to get the perfect poached egg. Easier than I thought. Simmering water, put a little bit of vinegar, then cracking the egg, not right into it at first, but then you kind of drain the excess water off through that sifter, swirl it, and then bam, tuck it in. It's like a little pocket of pillow and love right there. So now, the moment we love to plate it up, and then we add a taste. All right, so how do we build this gorgeous Chef Shelby stack? That's what I'm gonna call it. There you go, so we got our fried green tomatoes. We've just been letting that extra oil drain off. We're gonna take our hot little crab cake right here. And they match in size, look at that. I know, exactly perfect, lined right up. Like you said, we got that poached egg and we pulled it out of the water, we just kind of tucked that egg yolk right underneath, so you got that perfect little pocket. Yeah. And then that hollandaise sauce. Oh my goodness, you know I'm in love with this hollandaise sauce. Ah, in the blender, one, two, three, don't need the double boiler. No. Took all the fear out of it. Nice and velvety smooth. And bring it right back, a little bit of the Zatarans. So a little paprika or what have you on top, a little extra salt. Yum. Never hurts. Yum. And then just some real fine cut green onions. That's it. Dinner, breakfast, breakfast for dinner, I don't care, Chef Shelby. That looks amazing, look at that. Thank you. You gonna join me or? You first, please. Okay, all right. Well, I'm just gonna cut a little stack. Oh, look at that. Oh my goodness, I know I'm making everyone's mouth water at home. I'm gonna try to cut that in half. All right, oh, here we go. I always say when it's messy, it's delicious. Hold on. Oh my gosh. Oh! So good, right? That is outstanding! That is so good. Oh, you got the, mm. Oh yeah, you gotta get that little bit of yolk pour. Listen, this is unbelievable. That fried green tomato, who needs an English muffin anymore? Say bye-bye. New way to do it, my friends, right here. Oh! That crab cake, the hollandaise, mm, mm, mm, mm! Should've worn my brunch T-shirt. That's amazing. Thanks to my guest, Chef Shelby Farrell. Oh, we gotta find this recipe, oh my gosh. That is delicious, y'all. Find this recipe, of course. Breakfast, dinner, gorgeous, it's delicious. Wherever you wanna eat it, go to dinnerdiaz.com, along with a link to Oyster Catchers over at the Grand Hyatt in Tampa. Oh my gosh, Chef Shelby, I love you, thank you. I'm Angie Corley. We'll see you next time with more ideas for dinner, or as we call them, Dinner Diaz. Now go get to cookin'! Woo!