How imitation crab is made
Imitation crab is pollock fish paste, set with heat into strands and painted red on the outside.
- stations
- 7
- things upstream
- 13
- raw sources
- 9
- steps from the ground
- 3
The short version
Pollock spoils fast, so the fish is beheaded, gutted and stripped from skin and bone, then minced and washed in cold water until little but protein is left. That surimi freezes well. Later it is mixed with starch, egg white and flavor, extruded as a sheet, heated, slit into strips, folded into a rope and wrapped in red paste.
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Bone and mince the pollock
The fish are beheaded, gutted and washed. A machine separates flesh from skin and bone, and the meat is pushed through a drum with small holes.
Goes in -
Wash it repeatedly
Cold water carries away enzymes, blood and fat, including the system that would otherwise generate formaldehyde and turn frozen pollock rubbery. What remains is nearly pure fish protein.
Goes in -
Protect for freezing
Sugar and salt go in as cryoprotectants, so the paste keeps its gel-forming power through a year of frozen storage. At this point it is surimi.
Goes in -
Blend starch and egg
Spices, flavoring, starch and egg white are mixed in. Starch improves the texture, and egg white makes the paste stronger, glossier and whiter. Now it is called kamaboko.
Goes in -
Extrude and heat a sheet
A wide, flat nozzle lays the paste out as a sheet, and a brief heating makes it stronger and more elastic.
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Slit and fold the strips
Blades cut the sheet into a row of strips but not all the way through, like barely attached noodles. The strips fold up into a rope with lengthwise fibers, like muscle.
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Wrap in red paste
A very thin layer of reddish surimi wraps the rope, copying the color of crabmeat near the shell. It is cooked and cut to length. Chunk-style pieces use wider strips, cut at an angle.
Worth repeating
- The Japanese company Sugiyo first produced and patented imitation crab flesh in 1974.
- In 1969 a researcher found that sucrose acted as a cryoprotectant for surimi, letting it survive freezing.
- Two to three million tons of fish a year go into surimi and surimi products, about 2 to 3 percent of world fisheries supply.
Back to the ground
Follow every input upstream and imitation crab starts as these 9 raw sources.
Keep walking
Sources
- Alaska Science Forum, University of Alaska Fairbanks: Better seafood through chemistry
- Surimi
- Crab stick
Cite this page: "How imitation crab is made." Assembly Line, 2026-11-03. https://assemblyline.org/make/imitation-crab