All our hairy crabs are directly air flown from China (TaiHu). TaiHu is the third largest lake in China located directly upstream of the famous
YangChengHu. There are numerous reasons why hairy crabs from TaiHu are preferred instead of those from the main lake of YangChengHu:

• Lake TaiHu sits on the upper stream of Yangcheng Lake, the waters there are purer and thus a more ideal breeding ground for hairy crabs.
• The lake water is fed directly by the mountain streams which brings rich nutrients and minerals.
• Lake TaiHu hairy crabs, are known for their quality and are extremely sweet and tasty.
• The hairy crabs of Lake Taihu are known for their tender meat and rich fragrant roe/milt. 

     Shining Green Shell                                      Golden Claws                                    Jade White Belly                                             Golden Hair

                                                        

Ingredients

1-2 Hairy Crabs per person                                 appx ¼ cup vinegar

A few slices of young ginger                               appx 1 tablespoon of sugar/ brown sugar

1-2 dried perilla leaf (optional)                           appx 1 teaspoon of minced young ginger

How to eat hairy crab in 8 simple steps

What you need: A pair of scissors, a spoon and a pair of chopsticks.

1. Lift flap on the underside of the crab. For female crabs, the flap is oval and for males, triangular. Remove the heart, which is white. Discard it as it is too “cooling”, according to traditional Chinese medicine.

2. Pry open the top shell and spoon out the bright orange roe inside.

3. Remove gills as they cannot be eaten.

4. Hold on to the legs and break the body in half to reveal more roe. Eat the exposed roe and flesh. To get at the meat inside the shell, hold on to a leg and break off the corresponding segment of the body.

5. Snip crab legs off with a pair of scissors. Make a cut again between the two segments of a claw and remove the claw tip from the narrower segment.

6. Push one end of the narrower segment of the claw into the other to extricate the flesh in the latter. For the remaining segment, use a chopstick to get the flesh out.

7. Remove pincer from crab and snip away its two smaller segments.

8. Cut along the sides of the biggest segment of the pincer to remove half of the shell, revealing the meat in the front claw.