i know there is a thread on here about this already and the boil looks delicious. last night we were invited to a crawfish boil and it was the first time i was witness to the actual cooking process. i always assumed it was like our beaufort stew, just with crawfish. i was very very wrong.
my friend capt tom and his wife were nice enough to invite my gf and me to their humble abode yesterday evening. also in attendance were other cf notables - fishbowl, elevatorman, and the ever popular capt rick H.I.O.T.T. there were also 2 fine fellows there whom i didnt know. they may have been authentic cajuns, i’m just not certain
when we arrived tom had a gas burner going with a pot i believe to be large enough to fry 5-7 turkeys simultaneously. in the pot was water, about 75 lemons, several whole heads of garlic, potatoes, some type of louisiana crawfish boil seasoning, and (i witnessed) 2 full spice jars of cayenne pepper.
off to the side was a cooler containing 37lbs of live louisana crawfish that had been hand delivered to capt tom. when the cooks were comfortable with the potatoes level of doneness, a whole lot of lbs of sliced smoked sausage were added. shortly afterwards a lot of whole white button mushrooms went in. a big surprise was a big can of green beans with holes poked in both ends of the can. then the corn, and finally, all at once, 37lbs of live kicking crawdads and the pot brought back to a boil.
so, whats so different? sounds just like a beaufort stew doesnt it?
here is where it changes - they pull out 4 plastic 1/2 gallon milk jugs that had been filled with water and frozen solid. the jugs go into the pot to begin cooling the pot. then a water hose comes out and they begin to spray the outside of the pot. again to help cool the pot and its contents.
now i had never witnessed such activity so i began questioning WTF was going on. here is the answer i received - the crawfish were done, but they wanted them to sit and soak in the liquid to absorb flavors. without quickly cooling the cooki
