Gone Crawfishin'

Yesterday was one of those rare special days that my hubby and I set aside for ourselves and travel back in time to when we were courting. Yes, you guessed it, it was a date day, sometimes we get lucky and have a date night.

Now is the time in H-Town where we start to slowly but surely emerge from our winter chill of low 60's to 70's and beging to creep into the moderate 80's of Spring. It is also the time for every patio bar and BBQ to start offering up these:

From Crawfish Crackin'

These were one of the few new things I experienced when I moved to Houston almost 9 years ago!  Crawfish. I had only seen them once, by accident. I was fising on a pier in Illinois and meant to catch a perch or blue gill, when a lobster looking like thing came up on my line instead. My grandpa laughed and told me it was a crayfish. I think that is the same thing, or at least a cousin.

I have been exposed to a lot of food in H-Town since moving here from a small North Texas city that rarely breaks away from country cooking, Tex-Mex, and BBQ. A lot of foods here I find interesting, some very kick butt, but mostly, I am still pretty simple with my cuisine. For me, forget the fancy food, bib me up, and let the BBQ sauce dribble on down, while I wash it down with a cold beer.

Yesterday, on date day, the weather was perfect for a patio outing, so my hubby and I went to the patio bar down the street, Brewskis, and decided to hunker down with some cold ones and crawfish, before our movie started.  Now, I am sheepish when it comes to crawfish. The first time I even attempted to eat them as God intended, with your fingers, I was newly green to the city and the oilfield shindigs which often feature these tailgating style finger foods and booz.  I was not good at cracking them then, found them disgusting to feel in between my fingers, gave up on them (even though I like the meat alright), and just stayed with the chips and Coors.

But now, I am a happily married woman on date night with the love of my life who loves eating him some Crawfish and I promised him to give it another try.

Here is how it went down:



My hubby, raised in Lousiana (although he was born in the GREAT state of Texas), did not care for the over cooked all-you-could-eat Texas cooked crawfish for $20.  However, he was amused by his pupil (me) cracking open up the Crawfish like he showed me. Eventually, he took pity on me, and shelled them for me so that I could eat. Overall, the weather was awesome, the drinks were good, the company was kickin', but the crawfish cracking, well, I still find that disgusting (the potatoes and corn were good!). To me, it still felt like I was breaking open a big cricket or water bug. Plus, it is just too much effort for such little meat. I would rather you throw it in a sauce, just like I always have it. That way, I do not have to see the antennaes, head, and little insect looking legs or hear the crunching of the shell.

 Date Day was a lot of fun! I absolutely love gettting all smoochy smoochy and googly eyed acting with my hubby.  And having another crack at crawfish was definitely more fun than sitting down and some same ole same ole restaurant.