This colorful and nutritious Crab Avocado Salad is a cute summer side dish that fits in with almost any main.
Of all the wonderful types of seafood on this lovely planet, crabmeat is in my top five. It’s an easy one to forget about for many people who don’t live near an ocean, or who don’t have the budget for the often-expensive store-bought crabmeat. I grew up only a few hours away from the Louisiana Gulf Coast, so crabmeat is never far from my mind, and I still visit the coast every summer for a glorious week of catching and eating fresh seafood…including crabs.
Every morning, we gather all the beach toys, chairs, towels, and the crab line before hoofing it to the beach for the day. A few people in my family are particularly good at running the crab line—which is just two metal poles pounded into the sand in the shallows, with a rope tied between them and bait attached every two feet or so—but we all take turns going out there with a net to try our luck. I tend to scare the crabs away as I walk up to the line, but sometimes I get a few. Running the line all day usually yields a full ice chest of fresh crabs.
The flavor of crab is so lovely and delicate, I love dreaming up ways to use it in lighter dishes. This crab avocado salad is one of those creations. It’s a full meal but still on the lighter side. The crab gives it an incredible flavor, while the tomatoes and lime juice give it a pleasant acidity. You can eat it with tortilla chips, crostini, or with nothing extra—it’s just as good by itself as it is scooped up with something crunchy!
Types of crabmeat
If you’re buying crabmeat at the grocery store, chances are you’ve seen a few different types. This recipe calls for Dungeness crab, but you can also use lump crabmeat or crab claw meat. Any type of crabmeat you can get your hands on will be delicious in this recipe. But if you want to stay true to the recipe’s flavors and textures, use Dungeness crabmeat.
If you’re wondering whether you can use imitation crab for this recipe, the answer is yes! It will not taste the same as real crabmeat, but it will still please a lot of taste buds. It’s also a lot cheaper than the real stuff!
How do I store leftovers?
Store leftover crab avocado salad in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days. If you keep it any longer than that, you risk the crabmeat going bad or the avocado turning brown. I don’t recommend freezing this dish due to its use of fresh produce, which will get soggy after freezing and thawing.
Serving suggestions
This crab avocado salad is absolutely delicious when scooped up with Air-Fryer Tortilla Chips or Homemade Potato Chips. Try putting the salad on top of homemade Flatbread to slice into easy-to-serve squares. I particularly love this salad with fresh-cut apple slices for dipping; they add a sweet crispness that I can’t get enough of!
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup tomatoes diced
- 2 tablespoons red onion minced
- 2 tablespoons cilantro minced, plus extra for garnish, if desired
- 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice from half a large lime
- 1/2 tablespoon olive oil
- 1/4 teaspoon sriracha
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 4 ounces precooked Dungeness crabmeat or lump crabmeat
- 2 medium avocados
Instructions
- Mix together the tomatoes, onion, cilantro, lime juice, oil, sriracha, and salt. Gently fold in the crab and adjust the amount of lime juice to taste.
- Carefully slice the avocados in half around the seed, and either peel off the skin or scoop out of the shell with a spoon. Remove the seed. You'll have 4 avocado halves.
- Divide the crabmeat between the avocado halves, and top with extra cilantro if desired before serving.
Nutrition Info:
Nutrition information are estimates only and may vary based on the specific brands, ingredients, and portion sizes you use. This data is provided for informational purposes only.
This was delicious. I wasn’t sure you really meant ‘raw’ crab meat, so I used canned crab meat, which is already cooked.
This crazy summer heat wave, in the 90s every day for weeks, is the perfect time for a cool, refreshing, nutritious dinner like this. Hit the spot!
Thanks.
That’s great, thanks for your message Lauren
I was looking for clarification on “raw” crab meat as well. On the West Coast, Dungeness crab is plentiful, but we cook the meat as part of the cleaning process. Do you truly mean “raw” and it is “cooked” like ceviche, or are you referring to canned crab meat, and not heating it? (The only way I can think of to get truly raw crab meat is to catch it myself, or purchase from a live tank in an Asian market.)
The recipe looks delicious, and I can’t wait to try it. I’ve been looking for healthy ways to use crab meat, and this looks like an absolute winner!
Hi Jeremy, I meant cooked crab meat but with no sauce or seasoning. The easiest is to buy it canned but you sometimes find very good crab meat at the fish aisle of your supermarket. Let me know how it goes when you make it!
I love this salad…my husband loves blue crabs and to encourage me to want to eat them with him, he picks and cleans the crabs for me. I take the lump crab meat and make this salad every time and it is so delicious and also healthy. Thank you for sharing it and I can’t believe I haven’t commented previously about my love for this recipe!
Thanks for trying our recipe! So glad you both enjoyed it.
I just made this today, it was delicious! I used some shrimp as well and more lime and it had a ceviche taste to it. Really good and easy, thanks 🙂
So glad to hear you enjoyed this recipe! Thanks for reading.