Crayfish Boil in Cajun Louisiana
I'm speaking of an old fashion Crayfish Boil in Cajun Louisiana (within 100 miles of the Atchafalaya Basin)
I hosted crayfish boils for our customers back in the 1970's. Crawfish in peak season (April) were sold in 40lb. sacks at 18 cents/lb. (Way higher than that now)
The whole 40lb sack of live crawfish was added to 15-20 ears of sweetcorn shucked and halved, 15 lbs of baby red potatoes, and about 10-12lbs of Andouile Sausage cut in 2 inch long pieces. All of this was placed in a Cajun made perforated removable liner to fit in the 55 gallon cooking container.
The 55 gallon cooking container was about half full of water to which about 5 lbs of "swamp spice" (predominately cayenne pepper) was added.
The thing was heated with a cajun made natural gas or propane burner which would put out about a million BTU's if turned to max.
Once boiling the perforated container of food was added and boiled for about 15 minutes. Then the cajuns would dump in a 20lb sack of ice which would cause the barrel to overflow. The cajuns claimed adding the ice at the end of the boil and thus quickly cooling the boiling spiced water to about 140 degreesF drives the spices into the crayfish and makes them even spicier.
Long picnic tables were covered in newspaper and then topped with brown paper towel rolls .
2 men would remove the perforated liner of steaming spicy food pour it out in long mountainous pile running down the center of 2 prepared picnic tables.
Add to this unlimited beer and a band playing cajun music and you have the ultimate Feast-Party!!!!
This is all looks so yummy! Great post @ewspears
Wow!! Definitely an exclusive place with VERY EXCLUSIVE RATES!!
Thanks for sharing with us your experience.I'll stay tuned for more of your great stuff! @ewspears
This is a big time upgrade of the small "low country boils" we do in Florida!
Yes, I am now retired in Ocala, FL but spent most of my working career working in Texas and Louisiana!
Ahhh good ole Ocala! I am in Tallahassee - not too far away!
LOL sounds like fun! We do it a little bit differently up north (Pennsylvania). Whole hogs are roasted in a homemade 55 gallon barrel BBQ/smoker all night and then in the morning the red potatoes and corn are tied in pillow cases and placed in a huge cast iron pot over the campfire to cook. Everybody is required to bring sides and/or desserts or you don't eat.
Either way it's food family and fun, so you can't ever go wrong with that ;)
Thanks for the reply! Your PA Pig Roast sounds great. We used to do something similar when I lived on a Lake in Indiana. We would roast the whole pig similar to You in a homemade 55gal rotisserie. We always did it in August when the local scrumptious "Silver Queen" white corn was at it's peak. The fresh picked corn was soaked in washtubs of water. About an hour before the pig was ready, the corn was put directly on large hot grill and rotated several times. The outer shuck leaves would be blackened but inside was heaven!
To eat you peel down the shuck to form a handle at the bottom and the dip the whole ear into a gallon can of melted butter, sprinkle on a little salt and pepper and You have Worlds best Corn.