Crab Factory, Original Louisiana Boil: A Thanksgiving Extravaganza Lobster Feast

An Oceanic Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving holidays are just around the corner for those who celebrate the festive abroad in Western countries. I love Thanksgiving holidays. It has the warm autumn feel of festivity that echoes the Christmas holiday coming soon. Living in the states for a good six years, I spent six precious Thanksgiving with my sister and her family. It is indeed a big affair and just like our traditional Malaysian holidays like Chinese New Year, Hari Raya and Deepavali, all families head on home to gather for the festive holidays. Traditional Thanksgiving is celebrated with a big fat juicy roast turkey and trimmings. Well this Thanksgiving, you might just want to bend the rule here…

It’s my first visit to Crab Factory, Original Louisiana Boil at SS2, Petaling Jaya. Taking a spot facing the McDonalds in the famous SS2 square, Crab Factory is the brainchild of T.Y. Ooi. After taking a holiday in the states, T.Y. and her pals came back and got excited in bringing a taste of Southern Creole and Cajun flavours with seafood to Malaysians. Developing the recipes, snagging quality seafood from reliable suppliers and the rest is history as they say in the makings, Crab Factory was born.

Walking into Crab Factory, one is immediately at ease with its modern industrial décor from brick walls to cool grey walls and flooring, lots of decorative wheels, chalkboards, industrial lightings and wood mixed steel furniture. Right away, one knows that we should all just leave our prim and proper manners out of the restaurant.

At Crab Factory, one should feel like you are at someone’s home in the States where many would gather for a big seafood feast of crawfish boils and lobster boils. It is only fair that one should also dine like how it should be for every seafood boils back in the southern states to get the full experience. So be prepared to dine with your hands (your best tool definitely!) and the fact that there is no plates and utensils available in the restaurant except for small paper trays and plastic bags. Once the seafood appears, pour out all the seafood in the bags onto the table and dig in…

Ordering is simple, pick your seafood and then pick a sauce. Throw in some sides and bag buddies and get downright dirty delicious with your hands! Oh… put on the Crab Factory apron if you’re worried about your clothes but hey, let’s not sweat the small stuff for great food…

Since its Thanksgiving week, Crab Factory has been running their Thanksgiving Extravaganza Canadian Lobsters promotion. A big sweet treat, this Thanksgiving Extravaganza feast priced at RM145++ offers two Canadian Lobsters (1KG) steamed with King Mushrooms, Potatoes and Corn in a glorious Garlic Butter Sauce.

What a treat! This certainly makes a nice change from the usual turkey for the festive so I am pretty sure many will also attest to this since we are after all Malaysians and we do love our seafood.

The two lobsters are very good in sizes and when the bag was opened, a wharf of garlicky buttery aroma filled the air with much deliciousness. The lobsters are gorgeously succulent and cooked well. The oceanic sweetness coupled with the tender meat brought me back to memories of my sister and friends backyard seafood escapades where we would try and whipped up seafood boils and just literally dive into seafood oblivion. I enjoyed the lobster also because the garlicky butter sauce didn’t mask the lobsters but rather enhanced the sweetness of the crustaceans.

Check out the amount of lobster roe in this crustacean! Feeling rather smirk at the sight of such indulgence…

The bag buddies of potatoes and corn is quite the standard for any lobster boils and the addition of the firm king mushrooms added a nice local touch. After a good soaking, these bag buddies are buttery and yummy.

Now if lobsters aren’t your thing, then surely there is plenty of seafood to keep you happy. Crabs, meat crabs to be exact, comes in several sizes with its own price tag based on market price. Ours was steamed drenched in Crab Factory’s Signature Southern Bang sauce with a medium heat level. There are four levels of heat so choose your poison from Mild, Medium, O’ly Crab and Death Valley. Death Valley is pretty much suicidal if you can’t take spicy at all…

Our crabs looked ferociously spicy and red. One taste of the sauce and I can feel a little sweat starting. I happen to love spicy food and thinks my heat level is pretty good but this medium heat level is pretty much a kick in the heat sense. So make sure to go slowly and choose wisely if you cannot take too spicy. The sauce is pretty much addictive. The more you savor, the more you are hooked. I find myself going nuts about the meaty sweet crab with the knock-your-socks off Southern Bang sauce. The sweating goes off once your flavour sense adjust to the heat and that’s when pleasure comes in. I should go braver once day and take on the two higher heat levels in my next 3kgs of crabs…

Besides just being spicy, the richness of the sauce has a lovely lemony tang and lots of peppery notes. It’s piquant and simply moreish too. Corn was the bag buddy for the crab and it is a great one because the sweetness of the corn goes really well with the spicy sauce. We enjoyed the sauce so much, we jokingly ask for bread to mop up the sauces.

No plain bread but Crab Factory has Homemade Garlic Bread (RM7.90) available which we ordered to mop up the crab sauce. Pretty satisfied as the toasty garlicky bread matches the spicy sauce heavenly!

Next up, 500grams of Prawns in Jamba Jamba Sauce on medium heat level was pour out all over our table. The prawns are firm and bouncy with a very delectable hint of sweetness. The Jamba Jamba sauce is a tomato based sauce and has lovely sweet, sour and spicy flavours. Ok so I lost count of how many prawns I devoured that day but who could blame me as these were just irresistible.

We also took on 500gms of Australian Yabbies in Garlic Butter Sauce. The contrasting bright red with the sunshine yellow butter sauce is so pretty on the table. These yabbies were of a good size. As I plucked off the head and proceed to suck out all the divine flavours, I was telling myself how much satisfaction I was having right there at that moment. The sauce allowed the yabbies to really showcase the natural sweetness and also enhanced the creaminess of the yabbies. This one was RM88 but truly worth the price tag because I have never tasted such big and sweet yabbies here in Malaysia.

Other sidekicks we tried, golden crispy Fried Baby Squid (RM10.90) and Hush Puppies (RM8.90). Absolutely flawless, the crunchy lightly battered Cajun flavoured squid is super yum. When I saw the Hush Puppies on their menu, I literally beg for it. I had a few good ones back in the States and have missed this so much. Not many know how to appreciate these golden fried oatmeal balls but I really enjoy these here. I can taste some spices in the Hush Puppies and these have a medium dense oaty texture. Try it because who knows, you might like me!

Crab Factory has plenty more to offer than what I have tried. There are 17 types of side dishes from Southern Chicken & Waffles, Fish & Chips, Prawn Remoulade, Southern Heartwarming Gumbo Soup, Fried Okra and more… all the comforting Southern dishes. Seafood list goes beyond our normal expectations from the hefty priced King Crab to Slipper Lobsters, Amaebi, Japanese Snails, Baby Octopus, Mussel, Scallops and more. Don’t forget to add on more bag buddies to the seafood. During lunch hours, Crab Factory serves up quite a few variations of pasta with seafood. To complete all the seafood, Crab Factory has a long list of beers available to keep everyone happy!

So if you’re thinking of a Thanksgiving celebration with a seafood twist, head over to Crab Factory to check out the value-for-money Thanksgiving Extravaganza Canadian Lobsters promotion available from now till 30^th November 2014! Burp…

CRAB FACTORY

21, Jalan SS2/64,

47300 Petaling Jaya

Tel: +603-7865 5850

Website: www.crabfactory.com.my

Facebook: www.facebook.com/crabfactorymalaysia

Business Hours:

Mon, Wed & Thurs: 3.00pm - 11.00pm

Fri, Sat & Sun: 11.00am - 11.00pm

Close on Tuesdays