Whatever you call them – crawfish, crayfish, crawdads, or mudbugs – those little freshwater crustaceans are some of the best-eatin’ Mississippi has to offer. And the Lucius family eats more than our fair share of this seasonal delicacy every year.
In fact, I hate to admit it, but we have already had two crawfish boils this Spring, and contrary to the unspoken but understood laws of Mississippi hospitality, we did not invite a soul outside of the immediate family. Forgive us! Chalk it up to experimentation with our new cleaning and boiling equipment that Pops bought at Christmas.
Now that we have those initial culinary experiments out of the way, we plan to have our usual crawfish throw-down the first weekend or two in May. But between now and then, we might have to conduct a couple more trial runs – just in case.
For those of you who have never been to a true, throw-down crawfish boil, here’s what you need to know: It’s every man (and woman and kid) for himself.
No joke!
Regardless of whether you harvest those muddy beauties for yourself or procure them from another source, it really is a race to see who can eat the most crawfish and claim the family championship title for themselves.
But please understand that up until the exact moment when the pot of delicious crawfish and fixings is slung across the table, all is well.
Yes, indeed. We sit around and watch the chefs do their thing, stirring and watching the boiling mudbugs. We talk and laugh, while the kids run and play. It’s just like any other Mississippi gathering, until … that moment.
Then, even the dogs know that it’s on – when Uncle Eddie grabs the hook and pulls that precious pot of goodies out of the boiling, spicy-smelling water, and heads to the table.
Yep, it’s on, and it’s no-holds-barred. And that is the moment when the true redneck in each of us comes out. And let me just say, some of us are redder than others – almost as red as those good ol’ cooked crawfish.
I openly confess. I cannot compete with the rest of the family when it comes to eating mudbugs. Even as competitive as I am by nature, I throw in the towel pretty quickly after downing a few of them, and I settle on consuming the accompanying goodies – which at our house, means taters, corn, and mushrooms.
But the other women in our family can eat as much crawfish as any man out there. They kind of frighten me, if the truth is told. Keep in mind that I am the least ladylike woman of the bunch, yet my sweet, little Southern-mannered sister eats her weight in crawfish – and she does so quicker than lightning. (It’s the only time in my entire life that she outdoes me at the dining table.)
And she is not alone. Our younger generation of women go toe-to-toe with her. I’m telling you. It is scary to watch those tiny ladies devour the crawfish. Do not get in their way!
Often, I back away from the table and merely watch in awe as this brigade of lovely ladies pop the heads of those little crustaceans and use their beautifully manicured fingers to deftly hold the meaty end of the crawfish and ever so swiftly pull out that delicious meat with their teeth. Then, they sling the leftover shells into a neat little pile.
Nope! The women in our family do not waste time with the heads of these creatures. Oh no! That is not on their agenda. They leave the disgusting “crawfish butter” in the heads of the mudbugs for those with the absolute reddest of necks.
But you have to admire their protocols and their swiftness. Both are unquestionably productive, as evidenced by the enormous piles of discarded shells left by these petite princesses of ours.
But truth be told, I get the best end of the deal. I end up with quite a bit of my own crawfish, simply by means of pity – and laziness. Yep, just about everyone at the table eventually feels sorry for me and hands me more than enough crawfish to eat – without all that messy, hard work. It’s a win-win situation for this ol’ Mississippi girl.
So, hey … maybe I am the crawfish-eating champion after all.
