Crab & Sweet Corn Soup Recipe

To make the crab stock, combine the crab shells, onion, celery, garlic, canned tomatoes, bay leaves, peppercorns, thyme, parsley, and 2 quarts of water in a large stockpot or Dutch oven. Bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat and let it simmer for 1 hour, until the liquid has reduced by at least half.

Strain the stock through a fine-mesh strainer, pressing on the solids to extract all the liquid, then discard them. You should end up with about 3-4 cups of rich stock. Season it lightly with salt to taste. If you're prepping ahead, you can make the stock up to a day ahead and store it in the refrigerator; for longer storage, freeze it. If you freeze the stock, you'll also want to freeze the cooked crab meat, which I like to do by placing it in a freezer bag with a few tablespoons of milk to keep it from drying out.

Carefully cut the kernels from the 4 ears of corn into a large bowl; you should have about 3 cups of kernels. Don't discard the cobs yet. Use the back of your chef's knife to scrape the spent cobs into a separate bowl, extracting all that sweet, milky corn pulp.