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Louisiana Lagniappe |
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Crawfish Pot FAQ Q. How large a crawfish pot do I need? A. It depends on how many pounds of crawfish you want to boil. Each person can consume a few pounds (2 - 5 lbs) of crawfish, so the amount you want to cook at one time depends on the size of your gathering. An 80 quart pot will hold an entire sack of crawfish (about 40-45 lbs) plus all the corn, lemons, potatoes, onions, and sausage you would cook at the same time. If you are cooking these other food ingredients separately, then a 60 quart pot might be sufficient for a sack of crawfish. Q. How do I boil crawfish? A. There are as many different recipes are there are people boiling crawfish. Here is an old recipe adapted from an old out of print cookbook: Place all ingredients but the crawfish in the biggest pot that you can get your hands on and bring to a good boil for about 15 minutes. As all comes to a boil, put you face over the steam and take 10 deep breaths, as the boiling cayenne, garlic and lemon mist is good for your soul - being careful to breathe only through your nose.In the meantime, the crawfish should have been soaking in cold fresh water, with a couple of boxes of salt emptied into it as to allow "mud bugs" to be spitting out the mud. Put crawfish in boiling water. After water comes to boil again, add 10 ears freshly peeled corn on the cob and 20 small potatoes. Allow 8-10 minutes cooking time. Remove and add a bag or two of ice to cool the crawfish water, and allow the crawfish to soak in the pot for another 10 minutes after turning off the boiling water. Strain and serve the crawfish hot with the garlic cloves, potatoes and corn." (Alternate method: Remove the hot crawfish from the boiling pot and layer in ice chests with sprinkled Cajun seasoning.) Some people also like throwing anything from andouille sausages to whole heads of garlic to hot dogs into the boil ... be creative, but not foolish! For a great seafood dipping sauce, take some ketchup, add horseradish and Tabasco to taste, and finish with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice (never use that swill out of the bottle). Mix and dip. That's how we do it in Louisiana. Eating instructions: Find the biggest crawfish in the pile. Break the tail off of the crawfish, and slurp all the good juice and fat out of the head (optional). Peel off the first section of the crawfish tail shell, pinch the bottom of the tail, and the meat pops right out. Eat. Drink. Repeat. (Some people save time by pinching the tail and removing the tail meat with their teeth and eating it immediately, rather than wasting a few precious seconds getting the meat out with their hands. As one hardcore native crawfish eater once put it, "That way I could eat four crawfish to maybe y'all's one." |
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