We got a call yesterday that my wife's daughter wanted to come into town to visit and spend Mother's Day with her mom. She is now 26 and living out of state and I've been involved in her life since her mother and I got together when she was just 7 years old.
We talked it over and decided to have a crawfish boil when she got here and I went out and bought a 35 lb. sack of the lovely crustaceans to cook with the requisite seafood boil seasoning, smoke sausage, corn, potatoes, mushrooms, onions, celery, garlic, bay leaves and lemons to help flavor the boiling liquid. We also invited one of my darting buddies over that is from out of state and a regular when we boil seafood. The four of us ate over 30 lbs. of the mudbugs before calling it quits and peeling the remaining few for me to make crawfish omelets tomorrow morning for Mother's Day breakfast.
I'll be drinking water by the quart tonight from all the seasoning making my mouth feel dry as dust--------but it's worth it. LOL
The locals, or near locals will know where I'm coming from when I say it hardly gets any better than this for a mild late spring day's culinary delight. Oh, and the beer was real cold too.
Sounds like heart attack heaven. I can hear my arteries clogging. Actually, it sounds yummy. I can't take that much salt either. Not only would I be thirsty, my feet would be swollen so bad I could not get my shoes on and I would have to take lasix and have to deal with the inevitable major cramping later. Not to mention driving my blood pressure through the roof and the headache that comes with it.
Speaking of which, my feet are still swollen so sans yummy crab boil with garlic butter, I have to take another lasix and drink more water.
Speaking of which, my feet are still swollen so sans yummy crab boil with garlic butter, I have to take another lasix and drink more water.
imafan26 wrote:Sounds like heart attack heaven. I can hear my arteries clogging. Actually, it sounds yummy. I can't take that much salt either. Not only would I be thirsty, my feet would be swollen so bad I could not get my shoes on and I would have to take lasix and have to deal with the inevitable major cramping later. Not to mention driving my blood pressure through the roof and the headache that comes with it.
Speaking of which, my feet are still swollen so sans yummy crab boil with garlic butter, I have to take another lasix and drink more water.
I hear you on the salt issue because to do seafood boils right, it does take a good amount of salt and pepper heat to pull it off like we are accustom to. I will be drinking a good bit of water to flush the system but I've been fortunate that I've only had that swelling/bloating feeling a couple of times in all the years I've been doing this-----but I do know folks that this happens to, and they limit their intake and frequency of seafood boils.
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Lindsaylew82
- Super Green Thumb
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- Location: Upstate, SC
Lindsaylew82 wrote:I have never been to a seafood boil.... I feel like I'm sorely missing out!
And you are!! I probably boil a few hundred pounds of crawfish a year between what I do at home and helping out at other family gatherings. Crawfish are my favorite, followed closely by shrimp and crabs.
When figuring out how much to buy to have enough, the rule of thumb for crawfish is 5 lbs. per person invited. Ladies usually don't eat that much, but the men, and especially teenage boys tend to eat enough to make up for their smaller appetite.
If cooking shrimp, the amount goes down significantly with an average of 1.5 lbs. per person since there is a lot more meat to overall weight between shrimp and crawfish. If boiling crabs, rule of thumb is half dozen per person.
If you even make it to S.E. Louisiana, you owe it to yourself to partake in a good seafood boil, even if it is simply buying some already prepared and sitting under a shade tree consuming them with a cold bottle of beer.
I did go to a seafood boil many years ago. We did it at a beach house. We put the newspaper all over the tables and poured the drained pots onto the table with pots of melted garlic butter for dipping. Plates are optional, fingers all the way. We used nut crackers to crack the lobster claws. It is very messy eating, so it was nice to have an outdoor shower to hose off later and after resting being able to take a dip in the ocean. We also cooked oysters in the shell on the grill. Best oysters ever!