A sausage zealot. That’s what Anthony D’Avanza is. Anytime I run into him, all he wants to talk about is sausages. This guy is absolutely fanatical about sausages. This guy lives and breathes sausages. This guy will bend your ear until it’s ringing bells about sausages. Except for this week. This week he wanted to talk crab cakes. And I’m glad he did.

The place was the Mercado Centro, where they hung out their sign last week. Mercado Centro rose from the ashes of Espino’s, the not so super market that had been terminally ill for years.

Mercado Centro is a food court but not your usual food court. Because San Miguel de Allende is a lot like Don Day. It doesn’t welcome chains. So Mercado Centro is unchained. There’s not one of the usual food court inhabitants to be seen. Just local businesses like Anthony D’Avanza’s. And his sausages. And his crab cakes.

I was sampling as many dishes as I could at the different stands. And my belly was close to exploding when Anthony went by and whispered in my ear, “You’ve got to try my crab cake.”

OK, it’s only one more notch on the belt, I thought. And I have been searching for a better crab cake in this town.

D’Avanza Natural International Sausages, Etc. (yes, I know, not exactly the catchiest name) is located right about dead centre in Mercado Central. Franks and Brats and Polish and Italian are the heroes of the stand. But there’s also New Orleans’ contribution to the world’s best sandwiches, the muffaletta, and that crab cake.

Anthony’s partner and chef, Ivan Emilio Moran, who spent the last few years at Via Organica, went to work on prepping and plating while I chatted with Anthony.

“It took me five years to find the crabmeat from the Gulf of Mexico…blue crab, fresh”, Anthony told me. “It’s made with chunks of shrimp in it, parmesan cheese, butter, olive oil, parsley, garlic, red and green bell peppers, poblanos, a little milk, egg, and just enough bread crumbs to hold it together.”

I shared with Anthony my struggles searching for good crab cakes, particularly when buying them at the seafood counters in supermarkets. Occasionally, you might find a good one but, in most of them, the crab had gone AWOL.

“I think it’s really the generous amount of crab that makes these so good”, said Anthony. “That plus the added shrimp. It makes up about 25% of the mix.”

“That’s why these are called crab cakes and not breadcrumb cakes”, Anthony added.

Most of the crab cakes I’ve eaten in my life are what have been called New England, New Jersey, Chesapeake Bay or Maryland style. Most of them have been very good. Most of them have used Old Bay, that little yellow can that can sit in home spice racks for years without ever being opened. As much as I like the taste of Old Bay, I really liked the taste of an Avanza Louisiana-style crab cake. It has a freshness that just isn’t there with east coast cakes. And the sauce, that Anthony calls a tartar but I might call a remoulade, homemade by Chef Ivan, is light on the mustard, so it doesn’t mask the taste of the crab.

I asked Anthony D’Avanza how a guy from Florida gets a reputation for making a dish that’s associated with a state that’s hundreds of miles away.

“I had two large restaurants in Tampa, in the Latin Quarter, and we served families New Orleans food and we served families Sicilian food. Crab cakes were one of the huge items on the menu…Louisiana crabcakes, seasoned, and with shrimp”, Anthony said.

“We’d have customers come walking in and say I’m from Baltimore, Maryland and I’d know their first question. I’d tell them try my Louisiana crab cakes. If they’re not as good or better than you’ve ever eaten, you don’t pay for them.”

I savored my last forkful, put my 65 pesos on the bar and thought I doubt if Anthony ever had to deliver on that promise.

D’Avanza Natural International Sausages, Etc. is located in Mercado Central, Codo 36, in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.