Tails, You Win Every time

Peeling crawfish tails in Louisiana ... don't nothin' beat it!

You’ll find this at just about any crawfish boil in south Louisiana … along with a lot of funky music, beer and country-style hospitality.

“Jambalaya, crawfish pie and filay gumbo …

Hank Williams, “Jambalaya”

The taste of boiled crawfish tail meat resembles a cross between lobster and shrimp, depending on the seasonings used. If you’re not prepared for the taste it will, as your Cajun friend might say, “make yo’ tongue lap yo’ brain, cher”!

What might be called the three major food groups in Cajun Louisiana are boudin, crawfish and gumbo and it almost doesn’t matter how you make them if you keep it simple.

Boudin is a mixture of pork fat and meat, cooked rice, onions, green onions, parsley, salt and red and black pepper stuffed into a sausage casing and gently poached in stock. Gumbo, as my Cajun friend, Savy Augustine once told me, is “a roux you add stuff to,” thereby indicating the importance of a dark roux in Cajun cooking. A whole lot of Cajun cooking.

Two of the three major Cajun food groups: boudin and gumbo. Both will probably make you live longer or, most certainly, happier.

Crawfish need to be boiled in a “tea” made with Zatarains Crab Boil, (or a similar option of your choice) a cut-up orange, a quartered onion, a cut-up lemon, and some black pepper Bring to a boil enough water to cover 15 pounds of whole crawfish, add the seasonings and vegetables and bring to a boil for 10-15 minutes. Then put the crawfish in the pot and turn the heat off after another 10 minutes. Allow the crawfish to “steep” for 20 minutes, drain and eat. A single batch ought to serve 4.

Then use the same seasoned water for the next batch. And the next. And the next.

“Money won’t make you happy. But crawfish will.

And that’s just about the same thing.”

Son Robert, showing off a specimen caught in Savy Augustine’s rice paddy near Mamou, LA, in April, 1975

Savy Augustine, rice farmer, crawfish grower, friend.

There are two regions that make up the Cajun areas of south Louisiana. Settlements and towns near the Gulf of Mexico are distinguished by a bayou culture known for fishing trapping and hunting. Parishes (counties) to the north are hosts to cattle ranches and rice farms and it’s from those flooded rice farms that much of Louisiana’s crawfish crop is harvested.

Harvesting crawfish from traps set in two-feet of water in a rice paddy. This picture is from Fruge Aquafarms near Layfayette, LA, whose 3,500-acres produce tons of both rice and crawfish each year. https://www.frugeseafood.com/fruge-aquafarms/

Crawfish farms aren’t just for crawfish. The animals are “planted” live on rice farms, and in a clever take on crop rotation, those crawfish feed on the remains of rice paddies from the previous season. The result is sweeter than wild-caught crawfish that feast on algae, plankton and insects. As a bonus, we get to have all that rice for our tables.

Frozen, farm-raised tail meat

During harvest the smaller crawfish that don’t qualify for immediate packing are culled and returned to the rice paddies where they grow big and fat for next season’s catch. Rarely, you might be able to find frozen crawfish tail meat in one of the big-name stores. Or find it online. It will already have been cooked so just add it to whatever you’re making where it will re-heat and taste about as good as fresh-caught.

A typical Cajun crawfish backyard boil is about as informal as any human activity can be. Just toss freshly boiled crawfish out on newspaper and everybody dig in. It’s rare not to have one of these include somebody on fiddle joined by another playing guitar and yet another on the concertina (a small, hand-held accordion).

There is no age separation at social events in Cajun country. Little towhead toddlers wander freely underneath tables and the legs of standing adults and those adults range across the chronological spectrum. No “old folks at home” here. No babysitters needed, either.

Mardi Gras is not limited to New Orleans every year, but is also celebrated in the small town of Mamou at the same time —- the day before Ash Wednesday. This is the begining of Lent, a practice among Catholics of abstaining from things you like until Easter as a sort of pennance. Its timing is determined by the date on which Easter falls (the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox).

Mardi Gras in Mamou. The “Capitaine” and his men ride through farms in the countryside, collecting live chickens for the evening’s gumbo and revelry. They are followed by costumed riders and a flatbed beer truck on which a live band plays continuous Cajun music.

Mardi Gras riders in costume in the farmland around Mamou. This is how some of them ride back into town at the end of a long day in the saddle, drinking and celebrating before Ash Wednesday purportedly brings it all to an end. Just between you and me, it doesn’t. Incidentally, You don’t have to be Cajun to ride a horse like this but it probably helps.

Of course you can do more with crawfish than just boil it. One of the best alternatives is to make crawfish etouffee which, if you’re lucky, is almost guaranteed to be prominent on the menu in Heaven.

Find out how to make this fabulous entree yourself. Become a paid subscriber and you’ll have it … plus a recipe with each subsequent edition.