It's Crawfish Season in Louisiana ! Last Saturday we boiled mud bugs , potatoes, corn and smoked sausage and ate all the crawfish we cold hold along with cold beer to wash it down with ...but no matter how much you eat ...there is always leftover crawfish to contend with . So you peel all the boiled crawfish and put them in zip lock bags and freeze . Then , you can take a pound out the freezer and make my favorite crawfish dish ... Etouffee !
Ingredients:
1/4 cup real butter
5 Tablespoons all purpose flour
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup chopped green bell pepper
1/2 cup chopped green onion
1 cup chicken stock or broth
1/2 cup water
2 Tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1 Tablespoon tomato paste
1 bayleaf
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon Cajun/Creole seasoning
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 lb. cooked LA crawfish tail meat , thawed out if frozen
Hot cooked white rice as needed
Directions:
1.) In a heavy skillet or dutch oven melt the butter , then stir in the flour . Cook and stir , over med/low heat untill the roux is a caramel color , about 20 mins ... keep stirring .
2.) Add the celery , bell pepper and onions and stir untill the onions are transparent and softened .
3.) Add the stock or broth , water , parsley , tomato paste , bay leaf and all the seasonings . Stir the pot well so the roux is incorporated and there are no lumps , raise the heat to med/high and bring to a boil , stir well , reduce heat to a low simmer and simmer 30-45 minutes ( if it gets too thick add liquid) stir often to prevent sticking while simmering.
4.) When simmered , remove bay leaf and stir in crawfish tails and slowly heat through.
Crawfish tails are already cooked so don't need much cooking just heating .
Serve over a bowl of hot white rice with toasted French Bread ... to get the gravy .
a green salad will make the meal fit for company ...but bread and Etouffee do me fine .
You can also buy frozen crawfish tail meat in grocery stores ...it has been cooked and peeled so is super easy but don't buy the Chinese crawfish ...they treat it with a preservative ...it foams up in the pot and taste Wonky-Wonky ...avoid these .
Louisiana produced are good and don't have this chemical in them .
If you have never tried crawfish ... this is an easy and tasty way to do so !
Gary