blue crabs - do you pick out the meat, or make sauce

[Jim in CT]

My only experience with blue crabs is using them to make amazing marinara sauce.

But we were in the Outer Banks last week, and I did a charter with my son and wife's family, we went out with a guy who shrimps and crabs, we brought almost 200 blue crabs back to the house, had them steamed locally (I saved some for sauce).

The folks who steamed them gave us a quick lesson on how to eat them, but I was amazed at how much work it is, for so little meat. The meat I got was terrific, almost as good as lobster in my opinion, but it took a few minutes of poking around to get less meat then I'd get in one claw of a lobster.

But it was very, very good. I haven't been crabbing in many years (I buy them at a local place when I want to make sauce), need to give it a try with my kids.