Definition of "soft-shell" [soft•-shell]

• Having a soft, brittle, or unhardened shell, often the result of a recent molt. (adjective)
• A soft-shelled aquatic animal. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "O'Malley imagined the blissful, narcotic innocence of Toby's world where soft-shell crabs crawled into people's mouths and hummed a happy tune as they were chewed and swallowed."
• "Also highlighted is the so-called Trefa Banquet, a controversial 1883 celebration, in Cincinnati, of Hebrew Union College's first graduating class of rabbis that featured such nonkosher delicacies as soft-shell crabs, shrimp salad, oysters and frog's legs."
• "Stealing a glance, I expected it to be brimming with position papers, state secrets, perhaps even the briefing book I'd penned on the primary — "Maryland is famous for soft-shell crabs and political corruption; not necessarily in that order," I recall it began."