This flavorful Seafood Boil contains smoked sausage, shrimp, crab legs, juicy corn, tender potatoes, and more! There’s truly something for everyone in this filling seafood dinner recipe.
Easy Seafood Boil Recipe
If you can’t decide what to have for dinner tonight, this Seafood Boil is going to solve all of your problems. It’s got everything, and by everything, I mean shrimp, crab legs, sausage, corn, and potatoes. That’s a mouthful, no?
The corn and potatoes are boiled until absolutely tender, the meat is seasoned to perfection in a flavorful broth, and full, happy stomachs are guaranteed all around.
The best part about this meal is that the whole thing can be made in just under an hour. With all of that food you would think that it would take a lot longer, but the process is actually pretty quick! And, once everything is cooked, you just choose your favorite garnishes, serve it with lemon, and then you can enjoy.
What You’ll Need
What do you need to make this dinner a reality? Good question! Here are all of the seafood boil necessities that you’ll want to gather up:
- Vegetable Oil: For cooking the sausage in. You can also use whatever other cooking oil you have on hand (canola, olive, etc.).
- Smoked Sausage: Cut your sausage into ½-inch slices before starting.
- Garlic: For great flavor.
- Seasoning: I like to keep it pretty simple and just use old bay seasoning and bay leaves.
- Broth: My go-to for this recipe is low sodium chicken broth. You can also use vegetable broth, if you want.
- Water: To mix in with the broth and the beer.
- Beer: Use your favorite light beer. (Pale lagers tend to work well.)
- Corn: Cut your corn into 2-inch pieces before starting – it cooks faster this way.
- Potatoes: I like to use fingerling potatoes or yukon gold potatoes.
- Seafood: Round up some pre-cooked snow crab legs and raw shrimp.
- Butter: Melted. It can be salted or unsalted.
- For Garnish: I like to garnish this meal with fresh ground black pepper and chopped fresh parsley.
- For Serving: This is optional, but I generally serve a seafood boil on layers of newspaper, with lemon wedges and hot sauce.
How to Make a Seafood Boil
While seafood boils do require a lot of ingredients, the cooking process remains pretty simple. Here’s how to make it:
Here’s how I go about constructing my seafood boils:
- Cook the Sausage: Heat oil in a large stockpot set over medium-high heat. Add the sausage pieces to the hot oil and cook until browned on all sides. Add garlic and cook for 20 seconds.
- Stir in Old Bay Seasoning: Then stir in broth, water, beer, and bay leaves. Add corn and potatoes and bring to a boil.
- Let Simmer: Reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, for 15 to 20 minutes, or until potatoes are tender.
- Add Crab Legs and Shrimp: Continue to cook until shrimp are cooked through. Remove from heat and drain, reserving 1 cup of the liquid. Whisk the melted butter into the 1 cup reserved liquid. Pour the butter mixture over the seafood.
- Prepare to Serve: Spread a couple of newspapers over a table and arrange the seafood boil right on top of the newspapers. Season with fresh cracked pepper. Garnish with parsley. Serve with lemon wedges and hot sauce on the side.
How to Long to Boil Seafood
Even though you just read through the whole process, I thought it would be helpful to break down the specific cooking times for each piece of seafood. Since they’re all different, and can be hard to time everything so that each ingredient cooks perfectly.
Here’s the breakdown:
- Snow Crab Legs will need between 3 and 5 minutes to boil since they are precooked. If you decide to use fresh crab, it can take up to 20 minutes to cook through.
- Raw Shrimp usually takes between 2 and 3 minutes to boil.
- Also, though it’s not seafood, Smoked Sausage should take about 2 minutes to brown.
Tips for Success
Isn’t this meal so colorful and fun? I just love how it looks when it’s served on newspapers with all the garnishes, too.
Anyway, here are a couple of quick tips to help you get the best results with your seafood boil:
- Do I Have to Keep these Same Ingredients? No, feel free to switch it up! You can add lobster, clams, mussels, other kinds of sausage, etc. The truth is that pretty much any protein works in this dinner.
- Use Fresh Vegetables: While using frozen seafood works fine here, I would recommend using fresh corn for the best-tasting results. Additionally, feel free to throw in extra vegetables as you see fit – green beans or peas could be a fun twist!
- Don’t Overcook the Shrimp: Overcooked shrimp becomes rubbery (gross! :/) so if the crab is taking longer to cook than anticipated, you’ll probably want to remove any fully-cooked shrimp from the pot.
- Cook the Potatoes Separately: Potatoes can take a long time to boil, so if you’re worried about them not becoming tender enough, feel free to boil them separately and add them in after the corn boils. However, if you follow the recipe instructions, this should not be an issue.
- For a Spicier Boil: Add some red pepper flakes if you want your seafood to be a little spicier.
Serving Suggestions
I know it’s already a lot of food, but you can serve this seafood boil with sides if you want to! Here are a few ideas if that sounds good to you:
- Salad: I like to make a big green salad for everybody to share, or sometimes some coleslaw if it’s warm out. Potato salad is a winner as well!
- Bread: Garlic bread is always a favorite or even just some toasted bread with butter.
- Roasted Vegetables: Roasted broccoli, asparagus, and other veggies pair perfectly with this dish.
How to Store and Reheat Leftovers
- Fridge: Refrigerate this meal in an airtight container for 3-4 days. It makes for great leftover lunches!
- To reheat: Add a little extra chicken broth to a stockpot with your leftovers, and cook over low heat until everything is warmed through. I don’t recommend microwaving your leftovers.
ENJOY!
Seafood Boil Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 14 ounces smoked sausage, like andouille, cut into ½-inch slices
- 6 garlic cloves, minced
- ¼ cup old bay seasoning
- 10 cups low sodium chicken broth
- 2 cups water
- 12 ounces light beer
- 4 bay leaves
- 4 ears of corn, cut into 2-inch pieces
- 1 pound fingerling potatoes, halved (or you can use yukon gold potatoes)
- 1 pound precooked snow crab legs
- 1 pound raw shrimp
- 3 tablespoons butter, melted
- salt, to taste
- fresh ground black pepper, for garnish
- chopped fresh parsley, for garnish
- lemon wedges, for serving
- hot sauce, for serving, optional
- newspapers, for serving the meal on, optional
Instructions
- Heat oil in a large stockpot set over medium-high heat.
- Add the sausage pieces to the hot oil and cook until browned on all sides. Add garlic and cook for 20 seconds.
- Stir in old bay seasoning; then stir in broth, water, beer, and bay leaves. Add corn and potatoes and bring to a boil.
- Reduce heat to a steady simmer and cook, uncovered, for 18 to 20 minutes, or until potatoes and corn are tender.
- Add crab legs and shrimp; continue to cook for 3 minutes, or until shrimp are cooked through.
- Remove from heat and drain, reserving 1 cup of the liquid. Discard bay leaves.
- Whisk the melted butter into the 1 cup reserved liquid.
- Pour the garlic butter mixture over the seafood.
- Spread a couple of newspapers over a table and arrange the seafood boil right on top of the newspapers.
- Season with salt and fresh cracked pepper.
- Garnish with parsley.
- Serve with lemon wedges and hot sauce on the side.
Nutrition
Nutritional info is an estimate and provided as courtesy. Values may vary according to the ingredients and tools used. Please use your preferred nutritional calculator for more detailed info.
This Seafood Boil has become a yearly birthday dinner for my husband. Everyone just loves it. It’s so easy very good. . I do go overboard on the amount of seafood per person so it can get pricey. It’s so worth it. Thank you for sharing.
How many does it serve?
You want to plan about 1/2-pound per person. This recipe will serve about 8 people.
My boys love this! It’s perfect for football season.
That’s great! I am very glad you enjoyed it! 🙂 Thank YOU! 🙂
I know for sure this Seafood Boil would be a huge hit in my house!
I hope you and your family enjoy it! Thank YOU! 🙂
What a great and very flavorful recipe! This was so easy to throw together and my family loved this! Spot on with the flavors and such a hit here!
That’s great! I’m very glad everyone enjoyed it! Thank YOU! 🙂
I am sure this will be our new favorite dinner! Sounds amazing!
This Seafood Boil looks totally awesome!
So many great, delicious flavors going on. You get a little bit of everything in one dish!
I hope you enjoy it! Thank YOU! 🙂
Super flavorful! I love getting this when dining out, and this homemade version is spot on.
Thank you so much! I hope you enjoy it! 🙂
Really great flavor! Super easy to throw together but super impressive! Do you know if I could use a dry cider instead of beer next time? We very rarely have beer in the house since we don’t drink it, but we usually have ciders.