Crab-asparagus Lettuce Rolls

Total Time: 30 mins Preparation Time: 30 mins

Ingredients

• Servings: 12
• 1 lb crabmeat, real or imitation
• 1/2 lb asparagus, nice thin spears,divided
• 2 medium fresh scraped carrots, grated
• 2 medium fresh tomatoes, seeded and diced
• 1/4 teaspoon dried dill weed
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• lettuce leaf (iceberg or romaine works well)
• 100 g pecan halves, divided
• kosher salt
• cayenne pepper
• parmesan cheese, finely grated (optional)
• 1/2 cup ricotta cheese
• 2 -3 tablespoons cucumber-dill salad dressing (the thick kind, consistency of mayonnaise)
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1/2 lemon, juice of
• 1/4 teaspoon dried dill weed
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Recipe

• 1 combine all dressing ingredients in food processor or blender; blend until smooth and the consistency of a mayonnaise based dip.
• 2 cover and set aside in the refrigerator.
• 3 pour the pecan halves on a tray and toast, 7 or 8 minutes; remove from oven and sprinkle with kosher salt and cayenne pepper to taste.
• 4 set aside to cool, when cool, coarse chop 1/4 cup, leave the rest whole.
• 5 break tough ends off asparagus; steam for 3 minutes, just until tender crisp, there should be lots of crunch left.
• 6 plunge into ice water; slice all but 12 spears into 1/4 inch pieces.
• 7 scrape the carrots and grate, seed and dice the tomatoes.
• 8 rinse the crabmeat and thourghly dry on paper towel, squeezing out the moisture.
• 9 (if using imitation, chop into small pieces.) combine crabmeat, chopped asparagus, grated carrots, diced tomatoes, chopped pecans, dried dill weed, salt and cayenne pepper; mix well.
• 10 add 1/2 of the dressing to the crabmeat mixture.
• 11 use only enough dressing to hold the mixture together.
• 12 the mixture should be fairly dry, not runny.
• 13 reserve the rest of the dressing to use as a dip for the lettuce rolls.
• 14 wash and separate lettuce leaves, dry as much as possible, best dried in a spinner.
• 15 place 1 to 2 tablespoons of crabmeat mixture in lettuce cup and roll as tightly as possible appetizer size, use toothpicks if necessary, or leave open if you wish.
• 16 repeat until all filling mixture is used.
• 17 place on serving platter and sprinkle with grated parmesan cheese, if using.
• 18 (i like to grate the parmesan with my zester grater because it makes nice fine fluffy strings.) place a pecan half on top of each roll.
• 19 garnish the platter with more pecan halves and the 12 reserved asparagus spears.
• 20 serve chilled at least one hour.
• 21 the lettuce rolls can be made larger for luncheon use etc.
• 22 ,or they can be served with crabmeat mixture in a bowl and the lettuce cups separate for each diner to fill themselves, serve extra asparagus and pecan halves on the side.