Truth in advertising

I don't get it... yesterday was the third time in about 4 or 5 weeks that I ordered something off a menu that contained crabmeat and it wasn't crab...it was that fake stuff which is awful. The price reflected real crab. When I remark about it to my server they just kind of shrug and tell me most people like it or can't tell the difference. This has happened in 3 different restaurants.
I know the product is used to help keep food costs down but not noting so on the menu is deceptive. I won't be back.

Please tell us the names of these restaurants so that we don't have to learn this lesson the hard way.

Thanks.

[Robin Garr]

I don't get it... yesterday was the third time in about 4 or 5 weeks that I ordered something off a menu that contained crabmeat and it wasn't crab...it was that fake stuff which is awful. The price reflected real crab. When I remark about it to my server they just kind of shrug and tell me most people like it or can't tell the difference. This has happened in 3 different restaurants.
I know the product is used to help keep food costs down but not noting so on the menu is deceptive. I won't be back.

As Ron said, Carla, it would be entirely fair - and a service to the group - to name names.

As a generalization I'm going to say that it wouldn't surprise me to see surimi being used (and billed as "crab") in Chinese or Japanese restaurants, where the substitution seems to be so widely accepted that it's hard to brand it as improper practice even if we don't like it.

If it involves more "upscale" eateries, though, I'd definitely want to ask some questions about that.

I don't get it... yesterday was the third time in about 4 or 5 weeks that I ordered something off a menu that contained crabmeat and it wasn't crab...it was that fake stuff which is awful. The price reflected real crab. When I remark about it to my server they just kind of shrug and tell me most people like it or can't tell the difference. This has happened in 3 different restaurants.
I know the product is used to help keep food costs down but not noting so on the menu is deceptive. I won't be back.

Similarly, I was at Costco looking at a huge tub of "lump crab meat" thinking about crab cakes, then I read the ingredients. Blech. I think it is painfully disingenuous the way some retailers label their products.

[Robin Garr]

Similarly, I was at Costco looking at a huge tub of "lump crab meat" thinking about crab cakes, then I read the ingredients. Blech. I think it is painfully disingenuous the way some retailers label their products.

Okay, I'll bite (or maybe not). <i>What</i> else is in "lump crab meat" other than crab?

Similarly, I was at Costco looking at a huge tub of "lump crab meat" thinking about crab cakes, then I read the ingredients. Blech. I think it is painfully disingenuous the way some retailers label their products.

Okay, I'll bite (or maybe not). <i>What</i> else is in "lump crab meat" other than crab?

I can't recall the exact word, but it consists of other types of fish (whitefish comes to mind) - fish parts, so to speak.

[Robin Garr]

I can't recall the exact word, but it consists of other types of fish (whitefish comes to mind) - fish parts, so to speak.

That doesn't sound delightful, or truthful ... but I have to admit, your original post had me prepared for something even worse ...

Unless the manufacturing has changed Surimi is traditionally made with extruded pollock (m-m-good :wink: ).
Although I am not fond of it and find the practice of labelling it as "lump crab" abhorrent, it seems to be very popular. I was going through a bookstore in San Francisco's Japantown and found at least 6 cookbooks just for Surimi. It really should be labeled correctly though- extruded pollock cakes- not a good thing.

Unless the manufacturing has changed Surimi is traditionally made with extruded pollock (m-m-good ).

that's the word - thank you!

if it's labeled as "krab" or imitation crab, I have no problem with it. However, when a restaurant or store is selling "krab" as crab, and charging crab prices, then that's very, very shady, and I have a problem with that. Makes me wonder what any crab cakes I've had at a restaurant are made of.

True Story.

A few years ago, my husband and I were on this Sunday afternoon Harper's kick in the summer. We always sat outside and enjoyed the day.

My usual staple were their crab cakes. I truely LIKED their crab cakes. That was until the dreaded day that I never returned.....my crab cakes had fish skin in them.

After flagging down my server and making him get the plate out of my site, he asks if I wanted to speak to a manager. I did. The manager just shrugged and goes, "yeah, we were trying to use up some fish we'd gotten a few days ago for a special up. We must have missed some skin. Sorry."

That was it. GULP.

"Crab"salad at Rumors was the most recent culprit.

I've had fake crab in a crab quesadilla at Los Aztecas on Main St. I won't be ordering that again.

And that would be the other location.

that sounds beyond gross