Callaloo soup is a flavorful Caribbean dish with West African roots. I sifted through dozens of recipes, all different, to find this Trinidadian Callaloo and Crab Soup Recipe. It uses authentic ingredients, is easy to follow, and tastes amazing with a serving of white rice.
I say that this recipe is easy to follow, but I did have a few problems. First of all, this recipe uses dasheen leaves (better known as taro leaves) which I was unable to find. I did find the root however, which an employee at Usha Food Market called Arvi and described as very similar to a potato. I bought a few and hope to use them in a dish next week. For now though, the leaves are our focus. If you are unable to find dasheen leaves, use spinach. The flavor and texture are very similar, but the color of your callaloo might be a little different. Another ingredient I could not find was the scotch bonnet pepper. It’s not a very popular pepper in the US; substitutes include the habanero, but others will work as long as they are spicy and fruity. Finally, I decided to use twelve ounces of salt pork rather than a ham bone or pig tail. It was easier to find, cheap, and provided enough flavor that I didn’t bother with the salt suggested in the recipe. Finally, and most significantly, I had a lot of trouble with the crab. My two live crabs came to about a pound, so after leaving them in the freezer for ten minutes, I put them in boiling water for fifteen minutes. A good rule of thumb is to cook crab for 8 minutes per pound, and if the crab is floating at the top of your pot, it’s ready. So the cooking went well, but finding the meat was much harder. I’ve never actually prepared crab before, and despite a helpful video, I ended up with more crab mustard on myself than crab meat in my soup. Luckily, my mother was there to help and she salvaged some of it. Still, I definitely had less crab in my soup than the recipe had in mind.
However, the rest of the soup went very well. I fried my salt 
pork in a little oil–which became a lot of grease–while boiling my crab. I simply chopped my onion, spinach, mild peppers, and garlic, and set them aside. The okra are easy as well but often become slimy when cooked so sit them in vinegar for about twenty minutes. Then cut off the stem and slice into large pieces.
When my salt pork was cooked and crab meat was recovered, I melted butter in a wok. The meats, chopped vegetables, thyme sprigs, chicken stock, coconut milk, and water go in and then you just leave it all alone for fifteen minutes with lid on. If your kitchen is nearly as messy as mine was, you’ll want to use this time to tidy up.
When the time is up, add a whole habanero pepper and let your soup cook for another fifteen minutes. I was disappointed that my callaloo wasn’t more spicy, so I might try cutting the habanero in half next time. At this point you’re basically finished. Cook again for fifteen minutes, then remove the habanero and salt pork (you’re finished with these ingredients so you can throw them out). If you want your crab to be in chunks then take that out too, otherwise use an immersion blender to puree everything in the wok.
Just before pureeing, I began cooking white rice, but the recipe notes that dumplings are also delicious with this dish. The callaloo tastes great when it’s cold too, so keep it in the fridge if you don’t finish.
A Food Awakening 