Garlic Butter Seafood Shrimp and Crab Crescent Ring

A wedge lifts away from the ring, and there it is: pink pieces of shrimp and sweet flakes of crab tucked inside soft, golden crescent dough, glossy with garlic butter.

This Garlic Butter Seafood Shrimp and Crab Crescent Ring starts from three ingredients: two cans of crescent rolls, cooked shrimp and lump crab. A little cream cheese holds the seafood together, and melted butter with fresh garlic goes on at the end. It looks like party food that took effort, but the hardest part is arranging triangles in a circle, and the steps below walk you through that.

Why You'll Enjoy This Recipe

• Seafood you can see. Just enough cream cheese to bind the filling, so the shrimp pieces and crab lumps stay distinct.
• A crisp, not soggy, ring. Dry seafood, a lower oven rack and a real doneness check for the thick inner seam.
• Garlic butter that tastes fresh. The garlic warms gently in butter and goes on after baking, so it never scorches in the oven.
• Six ingredients. No seasoning blends to buy.
• Made for sharing. One ring makes 16 slices.

Ingredients and Notes

Exact amounts are in the ingredient list above. A few notes on choosing them:

Refrigerated crescent roll dough. 2 cans, 8 ounces each, for 16 triangles. Use the standard perforated kind, not seamless crescent dough sheets, because the shaping depends on separate triangles. Keep the cans in the refrigerator until you're ready to arrange them; cold dough is much easier to handle.

Cooked shrimp. 8 ounces, peeled and deveined, chopped into ½-inch pieces. Use shrimp that are already cooked and cooled. They only need to heat through in the oven; raw shrimp wouldn't cook reliably inside the dough. Thawed frozen cooked shrimp work well if you dry them thoroughly.

Lump crab meat. 8 ounces, ready-to-eat (refrigerated pasteurized or fresh-picked). Drain it, then run your fingers through it to pick out any bits of shell. Fold it in last and gently so the lumps stay whole.

Plain cream cheese. 4 ounces, half of a standard block, softened at room temperature for 30 to 60 minutes. That's just enough to hold 1 pound of seafood together without turning it into dip. Use block cream cheese, not whipped, which is softer and wetter.

Unsalted butter. 3 tablespoons, for the garlic butter finish. The crescent dough and crab already bring salt, so there's no added salt in this recipe.

Fresh garlic. 2 cloves, finely minced. It warms in the butter just long enough to soften and lose its raw edge.

Equipment

• A large rimmed sheet pan, about 18 by 13 inches (a half sheet pan). The finished ring is about 12 inches across.
• Parchment paper. It keeps the bottom from sticking and lets you slide the whole ring onto a board.
• Paper towels for drying the seafood.
• A medium bowl and a rubber spatula for folding the filling.
• A small saucepan and a pastry brush for the garlic butter.
• A thin knife or offset spatula for checking the inner seam.
• An instant-read thermometer (optional) for checking the filling.
• A sharp or serrated knife for slicing.

How to Shape the Crescent Ring

This is the part that's easiest to get wrong, so here it is in more detail.

1. Make the sunburst. Place the 16 triangles on the parchment so the wide ends point toward the middle and the pointed tips point outward, like rays of the sun. Leave an open circle about 5 inches (13 cm) across in the center. That's roughly the size of a salad plate's center, or a small bowl you can set down as a guide and remove.
2. Overlap and press the bases. Each wide end should overlap the next by about 1 inch. Press firmly along those overlaps, all the way around, so the band under the filling is one sealed piece of dough. Gaps there are where filling leaks and the bottom goes soggy.
3. Fill the band. Spoon the filling in an even ring about 2½ inches wide over the overlapping bases. Keep it about ½ inch back from the inner edge.
4. Fold and tuck. Lift each tip over the filling and tuck it under the inner edge of the ring. The strips won't cover everything; a little seafood peeking out between them is what you want. The center stays open.

The tips are longer than they look, so don't worry if they hang off the parchment before you fold them. Once folded, the ring fits on the pan.

Recipe Notes

• Times at a glance: 20 minutes of prep, 20 to 25 minutes of baking, then a 5-minute rest. The 50 minutes total on the recipe card uses the longest baking time and includes the rest.
• Garlic butter timing: it's made during the last few minutes of baking, so it doesn't add time.
• Yield: 16 appetizer slices, enough for about 8 people as a party appetizer.
• Ovens vary. Go by the inner seam check, not just the color of the top.

Serving Suggestions

Serve the ring warm, on a board or platter, with the center open. Optional extras, prepared separately:

• Lemon wedges for squeezing over the seafood.
• Cocktail sauce or a lemony aioli for dipping.
• A crisp green salad if you're serving it as a light lunch.

For more crescent dough party food, try Sausage and Cheese Crescent Ring. For other crab appetizers, see Creamy Crab Rangoon Spread or Crab Stuffed Cheddar Bay Biscuits with Lemon Butter.

Storage and Reheating

Refrigerator. Refrigerate leftovers within 2 hours of baking. Wrap them well or store them in an airtight container, and eat them within 3 to 4 days.

Reheating. Reheat slices on a sheet pan in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 10 to 12 minutes, until hot in the center (165°F). The oven keeps the crust crisp; the microwave works, but makes the dough soft.

Freezing. Not recommended. The cream cheese filling and shrimp lose texture, and the crescent dough turns soggy when thawed.