best dish ever

Sister went to law school in Camden, New Jersey. On the day my dad and I helped her move out, we had lunch at The Fountain restaurant in the Four Seasons Hotel in Philadelphia. To this day, the single greatest plate of food I have ever been served was the crab cakes at this lunch. Although I had already had my first meal at Trotter’s and was well on my way to pursuing fine dining wherever it was to be found, at this point it hadn’t occurred to me that I could be in for such a dish, in the middle of the afternoon in Philly.

 I am sure that surprise added to the memory but, whenever I am asked for my “all-time bests,” the crab cakes at The Fountain always top the list. Up to that point, all the crab cakes I had had were a made with a cracker-mayo combo, and ended up tasting more like fried crab salad. This one was just a showcase for crab meat; it was bound with the fish mousse and served in a lobster jus. The chef sautéed the cakes in clarified butter, crisping up the edges without too much browning and the entire dish was just about the sweetness of the lump meat from blue-claw crabs.

 Before then, I had pretty much given up on crab cakes. As it often goes, once I had had such a great example of the dish I was reinvigorated and started trying it all over the world again. Sadly, I was disappointed. Only twice since that day in Philly have I found chefs that are making this style cake as opposed to the mayo-cracker one, and both times I was let down. Crofton-on-Wells, in Chicago, has a crab cake bound in a shrimp mousse but there is too much yolk and, ultimately, it ends up tasting like a crab meat omelet.  The other one was served to me at Papillon in Denver. It was very close but was over-browned and dried out from its time in the sauté pan.

 

You never know what you will find when you aren’t looking. When in Philly, try the crab cakes. Who knew?