Red Crabs Could Be Seafood's Next Big Thing

The cameras were rolling Tuesday when workers at a Hampton fish house wheeled a vat of glistening Chesapeake ray toward celebrity chef Andrew Zimmern, who had come to Virginia for a taste of it.

The cameras weren't rolling a few minutes later when he put a forkful of Atlantic red crab meat into his mouth and proclaimed, "This is crazy good!"

Tuesday proved something of a doubleheader for Virginia seafood marketing efforts.

Zimmern, host of The Travel Channel's "Bizarre Foods America," had traveled to L.D. Amory & Co.'s seafood packing house in search of Chesapeake ray, an odd and plentiful species that, despite years of marketing efforts by the industry and the state, has proved a difficult sell to the public.

But, hey, with Zimmern on the premises already, Amory's owner, Meade Amory, figured he might lure the TV star to try trays of fresh-picked Atlantic red crab, a deep-water species that recently enjoyed a splashy local debut and that some in the industry think could be the next big thing.

To read the rest of the story, please go to: The Virginian-Pilot