Crab Cakes at Salty’s in Halifax

The Crab Cakes at Salty’s in Halifax were a bit small, but they were still among the best I have ever had and I gave them a 5 out of 5 Rating.

I have eaten at Salty’s Seafood Restaurant in Halifax a number of times and always enjoyed it. It sits on the Waterfront and is essentially a Pub with a decent, sea-food oriented menu. It is a bit pricey, although this is generally true of restaurants right on the water, but the food is generally worth it. Their Crab Cakes, pictured above, were not quite the best I have ever had, but they were well-made and tasty.

The menu, when I visited, listed Crab Cakes as both an appetizer and a main dish, although I see now that the restaurants only carries them as a (rather expensive) appetizer. For the price, they were actually pretty small (only two each per appetizer plate), but they were nicely pan-seared to a nice, crisp-crunchy golden brown.

If you take a closer look at the above picture, you can see that the Crab here is easily visible as discreet strands of meat that separate easily. One of my chief complaints about Crab Cakes when I am served them in restaurants is that the Crab is chopped to finely, or overmixed, or both, with the result that you get a dense, paste-like mix. For a glaring example of this for the purposes of contrast, you can take a look at my review of the Crab Cakes at Vineyards in Ottawa.

As I mentioned in the aforementioned review, I believe that the larger the pieces of Crab (chunks preferred) the better the Cakes. The Crab Cakes at Salty’s weren’t chunks, obviously, but they managed to avoid the error of overworking the Crab and, as a result, the sweet, natural flavor of the flesh wasn’t lost during cooking.

There wasn’t a great deal of ‘filler’ here (which is another cause for ruined Crab Cakes), and all I could detect was some finely chopped celery, and a little Scallion. The seasoning was limited, as far as I could tell, to just a little Salt and Pepper, and the freshness of the Crab was apparent. Overall, the Cakes were light, sweet and succulent.

My only major criticism was the choice of sauce that came on the side. It was supposed to be a Lemon-Mayonnaise but ended up being some sort of Chipotle concoction. It went well with the little carrot sticks that were included, but it was far to assertive for the delicate flavor of the Crab Cakes. In any event, the sauce was a minor issue and, on the whole, I enjoyed this excellent little appetizer.