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MY
ROUSES
EVERYDAY
MARCH | APRIL 2014
I
am a crawfish eating expert. It’s my favorite food. Absolute
favorite. I love everything about crawfish. The way it tastes is
of course important, but my love lies with the actual ritual of
eating boiled crawfish. It’s a food meant to be eaten in large groups,
dumped out onto one long table, everyone’s hands digging in. I like
mine extra spicy. I never use sauce, and I don’t eat anything else with
my crawfish beyond a boiled onion or two. I never suck the head,
but rather dig out the good orange fat with my pinky. And it’s about
the only time I really prefer drinking beer. I peel my crawfish super
fast, and the only person I know who peels crawfish faster than me
is my mother. She grew up in Opelousas and the only person who
peels crawfish faster than her is her mother. I love standing and
peeling and chatting until I almost get dizzy from spice and flavor.
It’s my Zen or as an English chef friend of mine once put it during
his weekly pilgrimage to Cajun Claws in Abbeville, “eating boiled
crawfish is truly a religious experience.”
But when it comes to boiling crawfish, I am definitely no expert.
It’s a skill that only one or two people have within every social
or family circle. My Uncle Jack has always been the boiler of my
family. My cousins and I would run around that big scary pot,
steam everywhere, sweat all over our faces. We had no clue what
was going on, but we knew that Uncle Jack was in charge and what
he was doing was extremely important and special. In college at
Tulane, my friend Jeff always did the boiling. Usually under the oak
trees in Audobon Park, there was always a great mix of kids who
grew up in south Louisiana juxtaposed with New York and New
Jersey kids who had never seen anything like it. Jeff ’s boils taught
me that eating crawfish with a bunch of people who know how to
eat crawfish is just as fun as eating crawfish with people who have
no clue at where to even begin. It creates an instant bond between
strangers. Jeff also threw crazy things in his boil like edamame and
chicken breasts, something I had never seen before.These days I can
say without hesitation that my friend Harry Barton reigns supreme
when it comes to throwing a proper crawfish boil. He has the whole
process down pat from start to finish. He even had custom benches
built on his back deck that serve as storage for all his boil essentials.
I caught up with Harry recently in hopes of gaining some of his
crawfish boiling wisdom.
•
Do you have a first memory of eating boiled crawfish?
My mother peeling them for me in the kitchen of my folks’ house
in Lafayette when I was very young. She couldn’t peel them fast
enough for me.
•
Who taught you how to boil crawfish?
I am self-taught. I read a few articles about timing and technique
For the Love of Crawfish!
by
Katie Culbert +
photos by
Denny Culbert