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Food for Thought:

This question made me smile, as it brought back memories of crabbing with my dad on Puget Sound in Washington. As a little girl, I was filled with excitement pulling up the crab pot to see how many we’d caught. After we boiled the crab at home, it was naturally served with melted butter (I didn’t think much about nutrition back then).

On its own, crab is a concentrated source of protein and contains very little fat or carbohydrate. A 3-ounce serving of Dungeness crab provides 94 calories, 19 grams of protein and 65 milligrams (mg) of cholesterol. Its nutritional downfall is the sodium content—321 mg of sodium per serving. Still, Dungeness is better than an Alaskan King crab leg, which packs 544 calories and a whopping 1,436 mg of sodium. Crab also provides more than your daily needs of vitamin B12 and is an excellent source of zinc, magnesium, potassium and the antioxidant selenium.

Look for fresh, whole-cooked crab during peak crab harvest season, December through April. An easy way to enjoy it (without butter) is on top of a mixed leafy-green salad with endive and radicchio sprinkled with a vinaigrette dressing.

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Jennie McCary, MS, RD, LD

IDEA Author/Presenter

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You can pose your own question to our contributing editor Jennie McCary, MS, RD, LD, a registered di... moreYou can pose your own question to our contributing editor Jennie McCary, MS, RD, LD, a registered dietitian and worksite wellness consultant with Presbyterian Health Plan. Please send your questions, along with your name and city/state/country, to editor Sandy Webster at swebster@ideafit.com. less

IDEA Fitness Journal, Volume 8, Number 11

November 2011

© 2011 by IDEA Health & Fitness Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is strictly prohibited.

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