Ingredients:
- 4 ears sweet corn, husked, kernels cut off the cob (about 3 cups)
- 8 oz lump crab meat, picked over for shells
- 2 poblano peppers, seeded and diced
- 6 Tbsp unsalted butter
- 4 scallions, thinly sliced (whites and greens separated)
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- Zest and juice of 1 lime
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- ½ tsp cayenne (or to taste)
- ½ cup fresh cilantro, roughly chopped
- Flaky sea salt + cracked black pepper
- Cotija or feta, crumbled, for finishing
- Warm corn tortillas or a hunk of crusty bread, for serving
To make it:
- Heat a large cast-iron skillet over medium-high. Add 4 Tbsp of the butter and let it cook past melted — keep going until the milk solids at the bottom turn golden brown and the whole kitchen smells like a bakery. About 3 minutes. Don't walk away, this is the flavor.
- Add the poblanos and scallion whites. Sear undisturbed for 90 seconds, then stir. Cook until the poblanos are blistered in spots and just softening, about 3 minutes.
- Add the corn in one layer. Let it hit the hot pan and char — don't stir for 2 full minutes. Then stir once and let it char another 90 seconds. You want dark spots.
- Add the garlic, smoked paprika, and cayenne. Stir 30 seconds until fragrant.
- Push everything to one side of the skillet. Drop the remaining 2 Tbsp butter into the empty side. When it foams, add the crab in a single layer. Let it warm through without stirring, about 60 seconds — you don't want to break the lumps up.
- Kill the heat. Add the lime zest, lime juice, cilantro, and scallion greens. Fold everything together gently — treat the crab like it's expensive, because it is.
- Taste. Adjust salt. Crack fresh pepper over the top. Crumble cotija generously across the pan.
- Bring the skillet straight to the table with warm tortillas or a hunk of bread. Serve it in the pan. It's the point.
The trick: brown the butter twice — once at the start for the poblanos and corn, once at the end for the crab. Two different butters, two different jobs, one skillet.
The tour version: when we're actually on the road and there's no fresh corn, frozen sweet corn works — just dry it hard on a towel before it hits the pan or it'll steam instead of char.
