Frank's Recipes! Crawfish Etouffee

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Crawfish Etouffee

Number of Servings: 6

1 lb butter, unsalted
3 each onions, large, chopped fine
2 each bell peppers, chopped fine
2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp white pepper
2 oz crawfish fat, or as much as you can get
1 cup water
2 lb crawfish tails, fresh
1 cup green onions, chopped fine
1/2 cup parsley, chopped fine

Melt the butter in a dutch oven or other large heavy pot, add the onions and bell peppers, and sauté over medium-high heat. Brown well, being sure to scrape the bottom of the pot frequently to loosen any stuck particles. (You want to caramelize the onions to bring out their sweetness.) This process will take about 45 minutes.

Reduce the heat to medium-low and add the salt, peppers, crawfish fat, and water. Stir well and let simmer 30 minutes more. (You can prepare the dish in advance to this point; about 30 minutes before serving, reheat the mixture over medium-high heat.)

Raise the heat to medium, stir in the crawfish, and cook for 10 minutes. Then add the green onions and parsley and let cook for another five minutes. Place generous servings of hot cooked rice in the middle of large flat plates and spoon the crawfish all around.

In Cajun country, crawfish was for a long time considered a poor man's food. The little critters were known as an agricultural pest, and hardly anyone would admit to fixing them at home, let alone be brave enough to put them on a restaurant menu. They finally went public in 1935 when a glorious crawfish etouffee was the first dish served at a levee bar around Henderson called Bernard's. Now crawfish are treated with the respect they deserve-in fact, every other year the little Cajun community of Breaux Bridge swells to over 300,000 people when it holds its International Crawfish Festival the first weekend in May.