Veteran Fishmonger: Stop Buying Crab Legs at Sam's Club (Get This $8 Bag Instead)

Sam's Club sells snow crab legs for about $15 a pound. Crack them, and the crab you actually ate cost you over $53 a pound, because 72% of that box is shell. In the same club there's a two-pound bag that does the job of most of those legs for about $8. I'm Gus. Forty years cracking, picking and weighing crab on the Seattle waterfront. Let's stand at that freezer and do the arithmetic the box won't do for you. In this video: • The crab leg math: 28 pounds of meat out of every 100 pounds of snow crab (Alaska Sea Grant) • Why the $30 tub of lump crab meat is cheaper per bite than the $15 legs • The ice glaze on frozen legs, and how to rinse and weigh a box at home • Two checks at the freezer: legs that knock like kindling, and freezer burn on cracked ends • King crab vs snow crab: about $71 a pound of meat vs $53.50 • Why snow crab still costs $15 (the Bering Sea closure and the Canada supply) • The $8 bag: Trans-Ocean Crab Classic flake style, made from MSC-certified Alaska pollock • The line on the back that matters if anyone at your table has a shellfish allergy • Salt: imitation crab has less sodium than king crab leg meat • Protein: real crab wins by weight, the flake bag wins by the dollar • Don't cook it, don't cut it, split the bag and freeze it • My crab salad, hot crab dip, fried rice, pasta and half-and-half crab cakes • The one night I'd still buy the legs, and how to steam them right Chapters 0:00 $15 crab legs that really cost $53 a pound 0:45 The crab leg math: 72% of the box is shell 1:54 The $30 tub of lump crab that's cheaper per bite 2:25 Read the tub label: blue swimming crab 3:07 The ice glaze on frozen crab legs 4:00 Rinse and weigh your box at home 4:47 Two checks at the freezer before it goes in your cart 5:32 King crab vs snow crab: which is the better money 6:42 Why snow crab costs what it costs 8:03 What are you actually going to do with it? 8:47 The $8 bag: Trans-Ocean Crab Classic flake style 10:19 The shellfish allergy line on the back 11:14 Salt: imitation vs real crab 12:08 Protein per dollar 13:18 Don't cook it, don't cut it 14:14 Split the bag and freeze it 15:07 My crab salad 15:42 Hot crab dip 16:00 Crab fried rice and pasta 16:25 Half-and-half crab cakes 17:09 The one night I'd still buy the legs 18:30 The short version for your next Sam's run 19:30 Weigh your box and tell me Next time you're at Sam's, bring one of those two-pound boxes home, rinse it and weigh it, and put the number in the comments along with what the legs and the flake bag cost at your club. Prices move by club and season, so trust your own sticker. I've got a long list of warehouse freezer boxes to put on the scale, so subscribe and you'll catch the next one. Take care of yourselves, and keep the newspaper for the night it's worth it. #crablegs #samsclub #fishmonger