Dish in focus: crab claw porichettu at Prince and the Peacock
Chef Palash Mitra’s signature crab claw porichettu is a richly layered curry of mud and snow crab cooked in a traditional earthen pot
He begins by cleaning and cutting locally sourced mud crabs into pieces, then marinating them with sweet matsuba snow crab claws, finely chopped Poona onions, cold-pressed coconut oil and fermented palm (toddy) vinegar, letting “the flavours meld for about 30 minutes” before cooking. It’s a deceptively simple start that sets up the layers to come.
To honour the dish’s origins, Mitra cooks it in a karichatty, a heavy, blackened clay pot traditionally used in southern India for seafood. Its thick walls retain and distribute heat evenly so the crabs simmer gently, keeping the meat tender while slowly concentrating the sauce. In warmed coconut oil, he adds fresh green peppercorns, curry leaves and Kandhari dried chillies “for that quintessential South Indian zing”. The marinated crab then goes into the pot and cooks until the shells turn bright, the meat is just opaque and the sauce has thickened. A final splash of coconut milk extract adds richness and body before he adjusts for salt and sourness.
Perfecting the recipe, he admits, took experimentation. “Finding the optimal temperature for the snow crab required some trial and error. Unlike the hardy mud crabs, snow crabs are more delicate, so it took several attempts to determine the ideal timing to add the crab claws to the pot,” he says. The result has clearly resonated. “Many diners are impressed by the cleanliness, precision and composition of this dish presentation, but it is the clean yet complex flavours that truly leave them in awe. The layers of flavours reveal themselves one by one, resulting in a wonderful dining experience for our guests.”