Crab Bisque

It's been quite a while since I've last posted, and it's because I've been out for dinner a lot lately, or we just kinda ate nothing spectacular in particular. Last night was some Italian sausages from Wegmans with a broccoli casserole type dish. I think I've already posted a cheesy broccoli type thing, so I'll just give a quick run down of what I threw into a baking dish:
3 slices chopped deli ham, 1 head broccoli (chopped into florets), 1/3 of a brick of cream cheese, 1 c. shredded cheddar, 3/4 c. small cubes of pepper jack, onion and garlic powder, salt, paprika. Bake all that at about 350 F for 20ish minutes and enjoy!

Okay, now on to the main attraction! I used to make these amazing crab puffs, but the delicious things were wrapped in crescent rolls. I had (3) 6 oz. cans of Bumblebee crab to use, so I found a bisque recipe. It was delicious, and I even got to use my new immersion blender I got for Valentine's Day! It tasted a lot like Silver Diner's Kickin' Crab Chowder (which has some corn in it). It needed a few tweaks once in the serving bowls, but I'll reflect those in the recipe.

Crab Bisque

Ingredients:

2 Tbsp. butter
3 shallots, diced
2 bell peppers, either red or orange (Don't use green. I guess yellow is ok too, probably not as sweet though)
5 c. chicken broth
2 c. heavy cream
1 tsp. salt and extra to taste
1/2 tsp. white pepper
1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper and extra to taste
1/2 c. dry sherry (I had to use white wine, it was fine)
18 oz. canned crab, NOT DRAINED (you can use more if you want, or add in the optional lump crab meat near the end after blending, or both, your decision)
2 tsp. xanthan gum or guar gum

Cut around the top of the peppers, allowing you to pull out the stem and seeds all at once. Like this:

I know it's green...don't use green..it's not my picture!

Be sure to check inside for extra seeds and pull the white fleshy parts out. Cut a long slit in one side, from top to bottom.  Salt the insides of the pepper. Place on a baking sheet and roast in the oven for 15ish minutes at 400 F. It will char a bit, that's fine. Turn over halfway through roasting time.

Saute shallots in butter until translucent. In a large pot, combine chicken broth, sauteed shallots, crab with its liquid (not the lump yet if you are using that at all), white pepper, cayenne pepper, salt, and sherry over medium high heat. When peppers are done roasting (they should be soft), use a food processor to puree them. I chopped them up a bit to fit around the blades better. Add the puree to pot.

Add in cream. Turn down to medium heat. Use immersion blender to blend until fairly smooth. I still had bits of red pepper, but it was fine. Now, the crab is already practically dissolved even before you puree the crap out of it with the immersion blender, but after you can't even feel it with your mouth. So, if you want, you can add in however much lump crab meat you'd like. Add xanthan/guar gum gradually while stirring. If you get lumps from the gum, puree again with the blender.

Cover and simmer for about 10-20 minutes. Stir every 7ish minutes to make sure there's no sticking to the bottom. You can also do chunks of shrimp if you'd like instead of (or in addition to) the crab. Hey, I don't know how fancy you're feeling today.... But if you want to keep it simple, using just the canned crab is perfectly fine. Add salt to your liking. Serve with salad if you want.

Fun Fact: Apparently the difference between a chowder and a bisque is that a bisque is smooth with no chunks, and chowder has large chunks of veggies or potato in it.

Recipe courtesy of Williams-Sonoma... sorta... I changed and added stuff.