Crab cruises on the Christina River start tomorrow.

You either grew up picking crabs, or you didn't.  Many of us Delawareans did.  For me, the smell of Old Bay will always bring back memories of toddling around a card table on the back porch of my grandparents' cottage while the adults picked crabs, drank Pabst or Piels, told jokes, and most importantly, got along.  Some of the crabs were caught in the canal that ran through the neighborhood, and some came freshly steamed from English's or Leo's, near Fenwick.  Early in my childhood, I was let in on the ritual (minus the cheap beer) - pulling open the tab on the bottom of the crab, cracking open the top shell, clearing out the "devil's fingers", and learning to ignore the guts, the icky textures and smells, and the stinging-from-Old-Bay scratches you get on your hands while seeking out that one perfect lump of crab meat. 

I've observed that people can be taught to pick crabs as adults, but it's just not the same experience for them.  They lack the ingrained ability to turn a completely blind eye to all of the messiness and irritations that come with picking crabs, unlike those who were taught how to do it almost before we could talk.   I myself have a weak stomach - I get queasy at the sight of raw chicken skin, or skin on the bottom of a piece of salmon.  But pulling tiny crab intestines, covered in yellow and green goop, from the belly of a steamed crab, or ripping the brain and jaw area away, is as inoffensive to me as picking buttercups from a dewy spring lawn - all because I was taught how to do this before I was old enough to have a concept of what "gross" is.  Conversely, I could be taught how to suck the head of a crawdad, and I might enjoy it, but I'd always have that little voice in the back of my head saying "This is disgusting".   One would have to have grown up partaking in that Southern tradition to enjoy it 100%. 

In Delaware, there are still plenty of ways for those of us who grew up eating crabs, and those who've come to the tradition later in life, to get our fill.  One of the newer ways to eat crabs is on the Wilmington Riverboat, an open air boat that takes guests on an all-you-can-eat crab feast while rolling down the Christina River.  The first trip of the season is tomorrow, and trips generally run on Thursdays and Mondays.  It may seem pricy at $44 a person, but you're paying for the boat cruise, not just the crabs.  It's probably worth doing at least once, and I'm seriously considering taking an in-law - who I have little in common with outside of the shared experience of picking crabs from an early age - for her birthday.  Click here for the details about the Wilmington Riverboat Crab Cruises:

http://www.wilmingtonriverboat.com/