CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11
recipe. Most popular is the Cajun style, which calls for infusing boiled crawfish with peppery spices and serving them with boiled corn and potatoes. Another popular offshoot is the VietnameseCajun style, in which the boiled crustaceans are sautéed with butter, garlic and aromatic ingredients such as lemongrass and citrus. GETTING THE MUDBUGS The first chapters of crawfish scripture
were written in Louisiana’s Atchafalaya Basin, where wild harvests began in the 1880s. By the 1950s, cold storage and the introduction of wire crawfish traps boosted harvest volume. Crawfish farmers found they could raise an excellent crop in flooded rice fields and produce consistently larger crops year over year. WEB EXTRAS That farming tradition contina Crawfish watch the ues with folks like Craig Radley, who weather. Read this converted 50 acres of rice fields story on our website near El Campo, in Wharton County to learn more. Electric Cooperative’s service area, into a swampy crawfish heaven. 14
Texas Co-op Power February 2020
Craig Radley of Pinchers CrawRadley calls his operation Pinchfish Farm empties a crawfish ers Crawfish Farm, and on one trap into a boat’s sorting area. sunny afternoon, he readied his flat-bottomed aluminum boat for harvesting mudbugs. He navigated the specially designed craft through the muddy water with help from a hydraulic, cleat-studded wheel that pushed along the slushy bottom. Radley hoisted each pyramid-shaped, crawfish-filled trap from the water and emptied the catch into a sorting area in front of his cockpit. As he went, he rebaited each trap with commercial crawfish pellets and put it back into the water to capture more. As he sorted and cleaned his harvest, Radley removed debris and tossed the smaller mudbugs back so they could grow larger. With a full load, he motored back to his nearby seafood restaurant, Pinchers Boil’n Pot. The crawfish are submerged in fresh water for 24 hours to purge them of internal impurities. After that, they get weighed and are ready for their starring role in the restaurant. Writer and photographer Eric W. Pohl, a member of Pedernales EC, lives in Dripping Springs. TexasCoopPower.com
