Speilsalen's sous chef shares his Malaysian crab recipes

Aril came to Speilsalen, the fine-dining restaurant at the Britannia Hotel in Trondheim, straight from a series of star-rated restaurants in Kuala Lumpur. He has been sous chef there since 2019. Aril says the move from Malaysia to Norway was a big one.

– I started at Speilsalen in May 2019, just one month after it opened. Going from the tropical climate I grew up with to living with four very different seasons was both challenging and exciting at the same time.

Being 17,000 kilometres from home, with a seven-hour time difference, probably does not make it any easier.

– Both colleagues and friends have helped me enormously to settle into the city and to succeed in this tough industry. In other words, a lot of people deserve a big thank you for that, Aril says.

As self-declared crab enthusiasts, we were of course curious about Aril's relationship with crab, and not least about cooking crab for his guests.

– Crab is absolutely among my favourite ingredients to work with, but I have rarely worked with crab in the restaurant kitchen or professionally. I associate crab with home cooking instead, the food I make for myself and my friends. Nothing beats the sweetness and the sheer pleasure when you manage to pull out big pieces of crab meat.

Do you have any good childhood memories of crab that you would like to share?

– When I was younger, crab was regarded as a luxury, and it could be hard to get hold of depending on the season. My late grandfather was a fisherman and used to bring crab home. All my childhood memories of crab are therefore tied to him, Aril says.

It was my grandfather who taught me how to prepare and eat crab. On the rare occasions when I travel home, crab dishes are the first thing I ask my mother to make.

How is crab used in Malaysian cooking?

Aril explains that crab is well known where he comes from. People are used to preparing it in many different ways, drawing on inspiration from across much of Asia.

– When we cook crab it varies whether we fry, steam or grill the meat over an open flame, and crab meat is also popular in soups and in various curries.

Malaysian dishes are often a blend of different traditions and flavours, with influences from Indian, Chinese and Malay cooking.

– One of the best things about crab is that you can mix the meat with almost anything, because crab stands up to different flavours very well.

We were also curious about whether being a Muslim affects how Aril relates to crab. Does Islam say anything about crab as food?

– In the Muslim world we consider crab halal to eat when it lives in only one element, such as water, Aril says.

This means, for example, that the sand crab is not considered halal but haram, since it can survive both on land and in the sea.

– There are probably differing views when it comes to eating crab, but the rule of thumb is that as long as the crab cannot survive both in the sea and on land, and of course is not poisonous, it is perfectly fine to eat.

Aril also says that cleaning crab is both easy to do and well worth the time it takes. One reward is that once the crab is cleaned, it is much easier to keep things tidy at the table.

– And last but not least, once the crab is cleaned it is also easier to get the spice flavours to work their way into the crab meat while it cooks, Aril concludes.