You have to make this. I always make crawfish pasta for company because it is a delicious dish with lots of flavor and isn't overly complicated. For company I usually make the pasta from scratch (Well, Seth makes the pasta from scratch and I make the sauce.) This night I wasn't up for making pasta so just made some LA rice. This is another Donald Link recipe from Real Cajun. I've adapted the recipe below for the localvore diet. I had some peeled crawfish leftover from a boil a couple weeks ago, but you can also use frozen Louisiana crawfish from Rouses.
1lb peeled crawfish tails
1 green pepper
1 onion
1 jalapeño
4 medium tomatoes
bunch green onions
juice of one lemon (cheat)
1 cup cream
butter
Salt, pepper & red pepper flakes
handful of basil
cup of rice
Saute the onion, green pepper, jalapeño and some red pepper flakes in some butter, about 5 minutes. Add the diced tomatoes and crawfish and simmer until the tomatoes reduce by about half, 10-15 minutes. Salt and pepper to taste. Add about a half cup to cup of cream (to taste) and let simmer and thicken about 10 minutes. Add the juice of one lemon, chopped basil and green onions and smother over rice or pasta.
So, can I call this an étouffée? What constitutes a proper étouffée?
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