Actually, Hubby found frozen crawfish – yes from Louisiana – at Publix several months ago and we’ve had them a few times and they will be our dinner tonight. In the unlikely case you have never had crawfish, they do look exactly like tiny Maine lobsters. The legend is when the French were driven out of much of Canada and made their way to Louisiana, lobsters were so sad to see them readying to leave some of them made the long trek with them. The distance was so far, they diminished in size along the way until they finally arrived at the destination at only a fraction of their former size. Notwithstanding such folklore, they are delicious although there is one genuine drawback. There are only 1-to-2 bites of meat in each tail and the claws are so small you can rarely get anything from them. Now, I will declare with no shame that I do not – nor ever will – “suck the heads”. I won’t even explain it other than to say you are welcome to do an internet query about what some people claim is a culinary delight.

Okay, in having a crawfish boil, it’s the standard as with a crab or shrimp boil to toss the crawfish in a large pot of boiling water with small ears of corn, often small potatoes and chunks of Andouille sausage. Cajun seasoning and maybe lemon wedges provide flavoring, and the other ingredients might go in first for 15 or 20 minutes as the crawfish cook fairly quickly. Then it’s pile everything on platters or tables covered in newspaper or something similar and have lots of paper towels handy. Twist the tail off and peel away the shell. Melted butter, cocktail or remoulade sauce are standard condiments. I will be honest that if I want to do other dishes such as crawfish etouffee or pasta, I will look for packages of crawfish tail meat (difficult to find around here). Trying to boil up, then peel enough to get ready to cook another dish is simply more work than I want to bother with.