SEAFOOD

Allow 6 stuffed heads per person. Get more than twice that number of crayfish so that there will be enough to make a meaty stuffing.

( We always bought boiled crayfish, so I was never able to try out the French thing of twisting and pulling the center of the fin at the end of the tail – it is supposed to bring the gut out with it. Wear gloves, it must be done while the beasts are alive and pinching. )

Step 1 - Peel the boiled crayfish, saving any of the yellow “fat”. Clean out the carpace and clip off the sharp nose and the eyes. This is optional, but recommended. Boil the shell debris in some chicken stock and strain it well. This will be the liquid for the bisque, and the shell will give it a deeper flavor of crayfish. If there is an oily red film on the water, do not discard it. This is the flavorful oil from the shells.

Step 2 – Make the stuffing. Cook generous amounts of minced onion and celery in vegetable oil. Add bay leaf, thyme and minced parsley. Mix with dampened and squeezed stale bread, smashed or chopped into small bits. Add egg as a binder. Salt and pepper to taste. Mix in the chopped crayfish meat and cook for a few minutes, stirring constantly. Stuff the heads and flour them by shaking in flour in a paper bag. Lightly fry the heads in vegetable oil and put them aside. Save the oil and any browned bits in the pot.

Step 3 – Make the bisque. In the same pot that the heads were cooked in, make another mirepoix with onion and celery. Add to it some peeled, seeded and chopped tomato and an 8 oz. can of tomato sauce. (This should not be like a thick red gravy, it will be thickened later with breadcrumbs.) Add bayleaf and thyme rather generously, salt and pepper, tabasco sauce, Worcestershire sauce, chopped scallions and parsley. Add the stock. If it looks like too little, add some chicken stock. Simmer the bisque on a low fire for about 30 minutes, add 1 whole lemon – sliced and seeded - and the stuffed heads. Simmer slowly for another 30 minutes, or until the heads are poached. Add chopped fresh parsley.

If it seems too thin, add some breadcrumbs to make it a thicker soup, or make a light tan roux in another pan, add some of the liquid soup to that, smooth it out and add to the bisque. The flour on the shells and the vegetables is usually enough to give it enough body. Some leftover stuffing can be added, (although that makes excellent crayfish patties – dip in flour, egg and crumbs, then fry. Dress with a little lemon juice).

There are other versions, many of which include green pepper. The above recipe is basically what my mother cooked. The three steps above usually corresponded to the three days it took to make without utter exhastion. It is best to have helping hands in this project, especially in the first two steps. It is worth every minute of the effort, however. Heat some French bread and go to it, or serve it over rice. This is one of those once a year dishes.

In classic French cuisine a bisque is a soup thickened with breadcrumbs.

This was one of our favorites and we had it often when crayfish were in season. We learned to make it from the description in Larousse Gastronomique. It is a very elegant and creamy dish and it is best if you start with live crayfish and purge them for a day before boiling. Most of the classic French cookbooks use a Bechamel sauce instead of cream, but we followed Larousse. This recipe probably should be called Crayfish Cardinal.

Any crayfish dish should contain some of the flavorful oil from the creature’s shell. This is extracted by simmering the cleaned and smashed shells in oil or clarified butter, then straining out the shell, using a hair sieve or cheesecloth. This step may be skipped if you are using peeled crayfish meat.

Use the flavored butter to cook a mirepoix of carrot, onion and celery. Tie together a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme and some parsley sprigs and add to the mix. Flame with brandy when soft, add a little white wine, taste and season with salt and white pepper, cook on a low fire for 10 minutes to evaporate the wine. Remove the bouquet garni and puree the mirepoix in the blender. Push through a fine sieve to make it smooth, then add enough cream to make it a thickish sauce. Add a little minced parsley and the crayfish meat and heat gently. Adjust seasoning. Serve with lemon quarters.

Serve in hot patty shells or place in a gratin dish, cover with a thin topping of Mornay sauce, sprinkle lightly with grated Parmesan and breadcrumbs, heat the bottom and cook briefly under the broiler to make some lightly browned spots.

Nantua sauce can also be used as a topping for poached or broiled fish filets. Try soaking some mild fish filets in milk, rinse and poach in water and wine - with herbs and scallions, salt and pepper. Remove and pat dry. Top with the Nantua sauce and crayfish meat, sprinkle with minced parsley.

Etouffé means smothered, and the cooking technique is much like braising. More slow cooking. This is our version of this dish. When the planets are aligned properly, it will taste much like the Bisque. Lemon is indispensible.

Chop 2 onions, 2 stalks of celery, 6 or 8 scallions, 1 bell pepper (I peel them) and saute it all in ½ stick of butter until soft. Add a whole stick of butter and ¼ cup of flour and cook together to make a light tan roux. Add two toes of garlic, pureed; thyme, bayleaf, pinches of black and cayenne pepper (it should not be hot with pepper), 1 tablespoon of Worcester sauce and an 8 oz. can of tomato sauce. Taste for salt level. Cook on a low fire, stirring now and then to meld the flavors.

Shell about 5 lbs. of cooked crayfish, which should result in about 1 lb. of meat; or use the one pound package of frozen meat - thawed slowly in the refrigerator. Pick out the “sand vein” along the back of the tail and discard. Save the yellow “fat” found in the heads and add it to the crayfish meat. Simmer the shells in 2 qts. of chicken stock to extract oils from the shells.

Strain the shell stock through cheesecloth and add enough to the mirepoix and roux to make a thick liquid to your liking. Add one lemon, sliced and seeded, the crayfish meat and a generous amount of chopped parsley. Cover and simmer slowly for 15 minutes or so to meld. Taste and adjust the salt, etc. Serve over steamed rice. It should not be soupy, but more of the stew school.

This recipe is based on the one in Bill Neal’s cookbook, and he credits it to Charleston. CC ordered it every time we went to his restaurant in Carrboro, N. C.. It has become a standard in many New Orleans restaurants.

Cook 1 cup of grits in 4 cups of water and ½ teaspoon of salt for about 30 minutes, stirring often, until it is thick and creamy. Stir in 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter, a very small pinch of nutmeg, a pinch of Cayenne pepper, ¼ teaspoon of white pepper and one cup of shredded sharp Cheddar cheese. Hold in a double boiler over simmering water for no more than 30 minutes.

Rinse 1 lb. of peeled and deveined shrimp and dry on paper towels. Dice 6 slices of bacon and fry lightly in a large skillet, until browned on the edges but not quite crisp. Remove bacon to paper towels. Add enough peanut oil to the bacon fat to make a thin coating on the pan. Turn up the fire and saute the shrimp until they begin to color. Remove the shrimp and set aside.

Add 2 cups of sliced white mushrooms and saute for four minutes, stirring often. Sprinkle 1 cup of chopped scallions in, add the bacon and one minced garlic clove. Cook, stirring, until the scallions and garlic are softened. Return the shrimp and any juices. Add 4 teaspoons of lemon juice, 2 tablespoons of chopped parsley, and a little salt and pepper, and cook until the shrimp are reheated and cooked through. Have ingredients ready and work fast in order to avoid overcooking the shrimp. Stir well and serve with the grits.

This recipe is fairly new to me, but it fits into our cuisine very well. (It should, being from Spain, where it serves as a Tapa.) The “barbequed” shrimp of New Orleans restaurants is probably a degenerated offspring. Serve in bowls, accompanied by crusty bread.

1 or 2 dried, medium- hot peppers, seeded and chopped. Or use pinches of the dried hot pepper flakes-with care. Cook these in 4 tablespoons of olive oil. Add 3 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced. Stir-fry, then put in 1 lb. of large or medium peeled and deveined shrimp, salt and pepper, a dash of sherry and a tablespoon of paprika. Cook, stirring, until the shrimp are cooked through. Do not overcook, just a minute or two on each side.

This may be done with peeled or (for that effect of sadistic rusticity) unpeeled shrimp. For a stronger garlic flavor, mince some garlic and mix it with the raw shrimp and let sit for ½ hour. Also cook a couple of crushed toes of garlic in the oil before cooking the shrimp. Add the mince along with the shrimp. Try to find paprika from Spain – peppery and assertive. (Keep paprika in the freezer)

The unenlightened call these Chayote. As a symptom of the decline of civilization, consider that New Orleans once had its own variety of this vegetable. It was thinner-skinned and larger than those now available. It also had a distinctive flavor which the desert-grown variety now available does not have. (In French, a mirliton is like our ocarina - a kind of flute made originally of dried gourd.)

Simmer 2 mirlitons until they are soft, about 40 minutes to 1 hour. After they cool, cut in half lengthwise. Remove the seed and scoop out the flesh, leaving a ¼ inch shell. Save the flesh.

Cook a minced onion in butter or bacon fat. When it is almost soft, add about ¼ cup of chopped scallions , ¼ cup of minced ham and fresh or dried thyme and bay leaf powder. Cook until the onions are soft, then add about one cup of coarsely chopped raw shrimp. Add the chopped mirliton pulp, salt, pepper and Tabasco to taste and cook, stirring, for 10 minutes or until the shrimp are lightly cooked. Off the fire, add 1 beaten egg and about ½ cup of breadcrumbs. Reheat for about 1 minute and fill the shells. Cover the tops with a thin layer of breadcrumbs and dot with butter. Bake in a 375° oven for about 20 minutes, until the crumbs brown and the egg in the mix cooks.

They may also be stuffed with just ham, or just shrimp or with crayfish, crab meat, or sausage meat. My mother sometimes made this with canned corned beef. I tried making it, but mine was terrible. Hers was fine. Summer squash can be used in place of the mirliton. Be rather generous with the thyme, the combination of mirliton, shrimp and thyme is one of those wonderful syntheses.

This recipe first came to us from Alice Craig. We enjoyed it at her table, and she gave CC the book of recipes that her family collected and had printed. That was the genesis of this project. Later, the recipe turned up in a 1940's New Orleans cookbook. Experience taught us to make the sauce well ahead and add the oysters just before broiling, especially if company was coming.

• 4 dozen oysters
• 1 onion
• 2 stalks celery
• 1 stick of butter
• 1 garlic clove
• 2 tablespoons flour
• white vermouth or wine
• 1 fresh tomato, peeled and seeded (or diced canned)
• 8 oz can tomato sauce
• 8 ounces of fresh mushrooms
• Tabasco, Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, thyme, parsley
• cracker crumbs.

Pick over the oysters carefully to be certain there are no bits of shell. Strain the oyster water through cheesecloth and add a little white vermouth or white wine. Lightly poach the oysters in this water just until the mantles curl, about 20 seconds. Strain (again) and save the liquid.

Saute 1 onion and 2 stalks of celery, finely minced, in 1 stick of butter. When soft, add 1 clove of garlic, pureed. Push the mirepoix to one side of the pan and move that side of the pan off the fire. Make a light tan roux with 2 tablespoons of flour on the hot side of the pan. Deglaze with some of the oyster water to make a thick sauce, but not a pasty one.

Mix about ½ cup of chopped tomato with tomato sauce to make a total of 1 cup. Put into the pot and add 3 tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco to taste, salt, white pepper, a sprig of fresh or ¼ teaspoon of powdered thyme, simmer until smooth – 20 minutes or so. Add 8 oz. of sliced mushrooms and simmer 5 minutes longer. It should be a thick gravy consistency. (Thin with the oyster water if needed.) Keep it rather thick because the oysters will release liquid in the final cooking. Taste at this point and adjust the seasoning as needed.

Add minced parsley, mix the oysters into the sauce and pour all into a gratin dish. Cover with cracker crumbs and dot with butter. Bake at 350° for 7 minutes or until hot. Broil for a couple of minutes if needed to color the top. Serve with a crusty bread and lemon quarters. This can also be prepared in individual ramekins for easy serving. Feeds four hungry people as a main course. Do not overcook or the oysters will toughen.

This, like all oyster preparations, does not freeze well. The oysters turn to mush and the flavor gets strong.

This can be done with catfish (soak it in milk for ½ hour to remove the muddy taste). It is better with something like flounder or other tasty fish. Lightly slash the skin sides of the filets, to keep them from curling. This recipe is for 4 filets, and serves 2 people.

Dry filets, lightly dredge in flour seasoned with salt and pepper. Heat 3 tablespoons of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of butter until the butter begins to color. Quickly sauté the fish, take out, then deglaze the pan with 4 tablespoons of white wine, 2 tablespoons of capers and some chopped parsley. Cook 1 or 2 minutes to reduce the wine. If needed, add some cold butter off the fire. Pour over the fish and serve with lemon. Simple, but delicious.

This is a good recipe for catfish filets, or any of those other mass-produced fish. It looks so fancy that no one would suspect that it is not trout or sole. The recipe is not suitable for salmon or tuna - or other coarsely textured fish.

Sauce: Make a Velouté: Cook 2 tablespoons of flour in 2 tablespoons of butter for about a minute, stirring. Add 1 cup of hot chicken stock or fish fumet (or clam juice). Keep whisking until the sauce thickens. Add ½ cup of cream, a small pinch of nutmeg, thyme and powdered bayleaf. Add more stock if it is too thick. Taste for salt and add some white pepper and a few drops of Tabasco. Continue to cook on a very low fire for about 20 minutes, whisking often (this stuff scorches easily, and the corners of the pot must be stirred, also). Stir in a teaspoon of cognac or sherry.

The Fish: Allow 2 rolled filets per person. Dry the fish filets and flatten them if they are thick, or cut them lengthwise with a sharp, thin knife – holding them flat on a cutting board with the palm of your hand. The filets are to be rolled, so they must be flexible. Slash lightly in several places on the skin side to prevent curling when cooking.

The Filling: Make a Duxelles with

• 8 oz. mushrooms
• 4 or 5 shallots (or scallions)
• ½ stick of butter
• about ¾ cup of dry white wine.

Mince the vegetables very fine or buzz them in the processor. Cook everything together on a low fire until the wine is evaporated, about 30+ minutes. Stir often and watch carefully to avoid scorching. Taste for salt and pepper and add some minced fresh parsley. It should be a coarse puree with the melted butter as the only liquid.

Spread the mixture on the skin side of the filets because the skin shrinks faster in cooking. Roll up the fish, starting at the tail end, and fasten with picks or string. Freeze the excess Duxelles for future use.

Chopped cooked shrimp, crayfish or crabmeat can be sprinkled on the duxelles before rolling - this is optional but highly recommended.

Place the rolls in a well – buttered gratin or baking dish Put into a 400° oven and bake for 10 - 12 minutes, or until done. (Turn one over to test, and poke at it.) Cover with the sauce, sprinkle lightly with breadcrumbs and grated parmesan, add some bits of butter and broil until it is lightly colored.

The amount of sauce given should be too much for 4 rolls. It freezes well.

Recipes very similar to this are to be found around the Gulf of Mexico and the Carribbean. It is what someone Spanish would do with these ingredients. Its meat counterpart is Grillades. Bass or Drum can be substituted for Redfish.

The fish should be whole, usually about a 4 pounder. It is hardly worthwhile cooking anything smaller. Be sure that all the scales are off. The head is a good source of flavor, but it is impossible to get all of the scales off it, so just cut it off and use it to make stock. (Don’t discard it before salvaging the meat from the “cheek”. This is the richest morsel on the fish.)

Use the head with 2 cups of chicken stock or water, onion, celery, thyme, parsley and bay leaf for the stock. Shrimp shells may be used for more fishy flavor. Add the tomato peel and seed goo for increased flavor. Simmer,do not boil, for half an hour or more. Strain through a fine sieve or cheesecloth.

Make a thick Sauce Creole with onion, celery, garlic, tomato and green bell pepper, parsley, thyme and bayleaf (of course), and use the strained oyster water and the fish head stock as needed for the liquid. Make a little roux and add it to the sauce as a thickener if you feel it needs it, but use very little ( the fish will add liquid in the baking ). The texture should be like a thick pasta sauce at this point.

Put the fish into a baking pan or fish poacher, slather liberally with butter (1 stick), in the cavity and the outside. Lay it on lemon slices and put lemon slices into the cavity and on the fish. Salt & pepper, and put the fish into a 350° oven for 25 minutes. Take it out and pour the heated sauce over it , add peeled shrimp and bake for 5 minutes more, then add oysters to the sauce and bake for 10 more minutes. Check the thickest part of the fish to see if it is done. Also look at the shrimp. The oysters should be no more than plumped up. The safest method is to cook the shrimp and the oysters in some of the sauce in a separate pot.

When you decide that it is done, remove the fish to a platter with 2 spatulas. Arrange the shellfish around it. Sprinkle liberally with minced parsley, and add some to the sauce. Serve with lemon quarters. This one of those dishes that is cooked by feel and instinct. Looking on the underside of the fish for doneness is important, and not easy to do. Try poking at it through the cavity. Do not cook it until the fish “flakes”- that is overdone.

This can be made with thick slices of bone-in fish. Adjust cooking times accordingly. Just do not overcook.

No one made homemade feuilleté for the pastry cases. We always had a good bakery or pâtisserie close by. This is another of those old features that has been improved away. There is only one bakery here that makes the little cocktail sized cases now, and they command enormous prices.

First, drain 2 dozen small oysters, saving the water. Feel the oysters individually for shell fragments or sand. Wash off if necessary. Strain the water through cheesecloth or a very fine sieve. Mix the water with a little white vermouth and add some shallots or scallions. Bring it to a simmer and poach the oysters until their mantles begin to curl up. Do not overcook, just plump them up – it takes only seconds to do. Set them aside.

Make a Velouté sauce: Cook 2 tablespoons of flour in 2 tablespoons of butter in a heavy saucepan, stirring, for about 1 minute. Do not let it brown or scorch. Add 1 cup of the strained oyster water from the poaching and heavy cream, combined. Stir with a whisk until the sauce thickens. It should be a sauce, thick but not a paste. The oysters will thin it later. Taste for salt and add pepper, a few drops of Tabasco, some powdered thyme and bayleaf and a very small pinch of nutmeg. The sauce should have some character, but not so much that it overpowers the oyster flavor. Let it simmer on a very low fire for 15 or so minutes to meld the flavors. Taste and adjust the seasonings.

Return the oysters to the sauce (cut up any that are very large), add some minced white of scallions and continue to simmer slowly for a few minutes. Mix in a generous amount of minced parsley.

Arrange ½ dozen large patty shells on a baking sheet and carefully fill them, using a spoon. Bake at 350° for about 10 minutes, or until very hot.

Frozen patty shells should be cooked beforehand in a 400° oven for about 20 minutes. When they look done, cut the lid out and reserve it, remove some of the uncooked layers of pastry, pushing the remainder down to the bottom to form a cup. Return the shells to the hot, turned-off oven to dry them out and cook the insides and lids.

As I said, this recipe is from memory, and you are free to improve on it. (This does not mean anything dumb, like adding Jalapeno peppers, or marshmallows.) I have cooked it successfully. The large patties are enough for a main course. We had the small (about 1 ½ inch) patty shells, with a chopped version of the above,made by my mother, every Thanksgiving. They were served with champagne and preceded the dinner of turkey stuffed with oyster dressing. The best of all possible worlds. (See below)

My mother made these often, and none of us knew that we were eating something called Empanadas. We called them fried oyster patties.

Make an unsweet pie dough with egg. Use the basic recipe above for the filling, except that the oysters are chopped and the filling is a little thicker and has more hot pepper – a pinch of cayenne, plus a generous amount of sauteed chopped scallions, parsley and some black pepper. Chill the filling before using, so that it is thick and easy to manage. Roll out the pie dough rather thin and cut it into 6 inch squares, or experiment to find the size you think best. Put oyster filling on them, moisten the edges with water, and fold the dough to make a triangle that encloses the filling, pinching the edges together. Fry in an adequate amount of oil, flipping them over when half done, or bake at 350°.

My mother’s original recipe, for the small hors d’oeuvre patties, is as follows: (Remarks are mine)

• 2 doz. small patty shells
• 2 or 3 doz. raw oysters
• 1 Tablespoon of flour
• 1 bunch of green onions (5 or 6) chopped
• ½ bunch of parsley (10 sprigs, leaves only) minced
• salt and pepper
• ½ stick (2 oz.) butter.

Feel the oysters individually for shell fragments or sand, strain the oyster water through a very fine sieve or cheesecloth into a saucepan. One cup or more is needed, and water can be added to increase the amount.

Coarsely chop the oysters.  Melt the butter in a pan and cook the onions until softened,  stirring often.   Add the flour quickly and cook,  stirring  (to make a white roux),  then add the oysters and parsley. Quickly thin the mix with the oyster water until it is a thick liquid.    Taste for seasoning,  and adjust the salt and pepper to taste.  I know she always put a little Tabasco sauce in the mix,  and probably about a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce.

Fill the shells with a teaspoon and put the tops back on. To quote from her notes: “Two ways to fill shells, fill the cold shell and heat very hot (oven) or heat the shells and fill with warm filling. I like to fill cold and heat very hot.” (Place the filled shells in a 400° oven for about 3 to 5 minutes – try one before serving.) The large patty shells can be filled in the same way and served one per person for a first or a main course.

Classic French sauce remoulade: Mash three hard boiled egg yolks until smooth, add ½ teaspoon of Dijon mustard, mix well. Add 1 tablespoon of white wine vinegar, a pinch of salt and cayenne pepper. Add 3 tablespoons of olive oil, drop by drop, while whisking all the time until it is emulsified and smooth. Add 1 raw egg yolk and keep whisking to incorporate it fully. Add ¼ teaspoon of pureed garlic and ¼ teaspoon of powdered tarragon. Or bang everything into a blender or processor, following the same sequence as above.

New Orleans Remoulade: In a blender or processor, put ½ cup chopped onion, ¾ cup of oil, ¼ cup of tarragon vinegar (Or use fresh or dried tarragon soaked in white vinegar), ½ cup of brown Creole mustard, 2 teaspoons of paprika, ½ teaspoon of Cayenne pepper, 1 teaspoon of salt, 2 cloves of chopped garlic. Blend for about 10 seconds then wipe down the sides and reblend. Add ½ cup of chopped scallions and a chopped hard-boiled egg and pulse twice. The scallion and egg should be in bits, not pureed. Or just mince everything by hand.

Another local version is made with mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup and green onions, parsley, celery and garlic – all minced fine, tabasco sauce, salt and pepper. This is what you get in the middling restaurants. All of these sauces should be matured for several hours or overnight.

Shrimp Remoulade is made by soaking boiled and peeled shrimp in the sauce for ½ hour or more, then serving over a bed of shredded leaf lettuce. The lettuce is integral to the dish, not just decorative.

Simple Devilled Eggs napped with Remoulade sauce make a very good hors d’oeuvre course. Room temperature hard boiled eggs will do for the lazy. Do not forget the shredded lettuce.

This one is easy: mix ketchup, prepared horseradish (not the “horseradish cream sauce”or whatever it’s called – just buy prepared horseradish) and Louisiana hot sauce with a little lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce until it tastes right to you. Use with any shellfish. Maylie’s Restaurant served it with hot boiled beef brisket, yum.

Keep prepared horseradish in the freezer and it will last for a year or so, otherwise it will turn gray and lose all flavor.

Our favorite lobster dip is melted butter with a little Cognac or good brandy stirred in.

CC found this somewhere, and it turned out to be very good when she made it and so became part of her repertoire. I always peel the bell peppers, not because it is elegant (it is), but because I cannot digest the skin of the pepper.

• 1 lb. of peeled raw shrimp
• 3 green bell peppers-peeled and cut into narrow strips
• 6 tablespoons of flour
• 2 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese, grated
• 2 cloves of garlic
• ½ cup of olive oil
• ¼ cup of white wine,
• salt and pepper to taste.

Place the flour, cheese and salt into a paper bag and shake well to mix, add the shrimp (patted dry) and shake to coat them well. Let them rest to dry a little – 10 min. or so, then heat the oil in a frying pan, crush the garlic and cook it until it is fragrant. Remove when it begins to color. The idea is to flavor the oil.

Put the shrimp into the hot frying pan with the oil on a medium fire. Cook for about one minute, then turn and cook the other side until the shrimp are opaque. Place the shrimp on a rack set on the serving platter and keep warm in a low oven. The coating should be pleasantly crisp.

Put the pepper strips into the pan, lower heat to medium, cover and cook for 10 minutes – or until tender. Deglaze the pan with a little white wine, finish the sauce with bits of cold butter. Serve with rice or pasta.

The original recipe had the shrimp reheated in the sauce, but we liked the texture of the crisp coating on the shrimp, with the sauce on the side.

This version is our own, derived from a verbal recipe from Galatoire’s restaurant.

Be very careful to mix the crabmeat into the stuffing mix as the very last thing and toss it quickly in order to keep the meat in large pieces.

The shells should be well washed with a plastic pot scrubber, and the eyes, mouth and all sharp points are clipped off with scissors. The mix can also be cooked in buttered ramekins when shells are not available.

The stuffed crabs freeze well uncooked. Wrap each one in plastic wrap, then in foil. To cook, unwrap and top them with a coating of softened butter and breadcrumbs while still frozen; covering the stuffing only. Bake at 350° for about 40 minutes. They will ooze liquid, so put them on a baking pan with sides, lined with foil. It is best to let them thaw for a day or so before baking.

Make a thick Bechamel, adding a little white wine or dry vermouth and a very small pinch of nutmeg. You will not need all of it, depending upon the amount of crabmeat available.

Chop an onion and 2 stalks of celery and cook in butter, along with thyme and bayleaf, until soft. Add a little bit of breadcrumbs, a small amount of chopped scallions and a ¼ cup of chopped parsley, a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce and ¼ teaspoon of Tabasco. Add an egg yolk and salt and pepper to the Bechamel and gradually add to the onion mix. Gently fold in the crabmeat to keep the pieces intact. It should be not be gloppy but stiff enough to mound. Stuff the shell, using a spoon.

The egg, Bechamel and breadcrumbs are all binders and it is unnecessary to use much breadcrumb, except to stretch or stiffen the mix. Top with breadcrumbs and butter bits and bake at 350° for 30+ minutes, until the top is browned and the filling cooked. It is a good idea to taste the mix before filling the shells and the way to do it is to lightly sauté a small patty of the stuffing.

Same mix as above. Form into patties and chill to firm them. They may be sauteed on low heat in butter, or panèed: dip in flour, then egg, then breadcrumbs and fry gently in butter. Serve these or stuffed crabs with lemon quarters.

Gently warm lump crabmeat in a generous amount of butter containing minced parsley, a little tarragon, cooked shallot or scallions, and white pepper. Salt to tast. Put into a gratin dish, or individual ramekins, sprinkle lightly with breadcrumbs or cracker crumbs, dot with butter and broil on low setting just until the crumbs color - two or three minutes. Elegantly simple and delicious.

I am far from knowledgeable in this area. We never deep fried anything, but I do know a few things about it. Do not fry with cornmeal, it is corn flour for this job. I have long cherished the belief that it is the same thing as masa harina. I cannot find any information in cookbooks. At any rate, use it. The boxed “fish fry” lists corn flour, not meal. Also deep fry at 350°. If you want to try deep frying, by all means get a proper thermometer. It can be done in a deep saucepan, a little at a time, instead of the electric deep fry gadget.

One time when we were visiting CC’s aunt Madeline Shepherd in Virginia, she took us to the local buffet lunch. It featured fried oysters, but when we bit into the dark crust, there was nothing inside. They had fried it so long, or in such heat, that the oysters disappeared and just left a shell. Never eat fried oysters in Bedford, Virginia.

Home frying of oysters is best done in a rather narrow saucepan and in small batches. Do not try to save the oil for another day, it does not work. This is the sum total of my deep-frying knowledge.

The diFranco family ran a small bar and sandwich shop in our neighborhood. Mrs. diFranco made oyster loaves filled with plump and ethereally crisp oysters. She told my mother that she used a little baking powder in the coating. They were fried with cracker crumbs, I believe. The old New Orleans method for frying oysters was to dip dried-off large oysters in a mix of 1 egg : 1 cup of milk, seasoned. Then they were rolled in fine cracker crumbs and dropped into lard or Crisco to deep fry. They cooked very quickly and were a light golden color, not brown, when taken out. Perfection when put over shredded leaf lettuce in a hollowed-out half of French bread (not poor-boy bread), then doused with melted butter, with cocktail sauce on the side. Salt pickle assorts well as a garnish. Makes cold beer taste very good. (French Bread was about 14” long and wide in the middle, with pointed ends. It seems to have disappeared since the Barbarian invasion of New Orleans.)

see under Vegetables: Oysters and Artichokes

A real fish salad is delicious. Use leftovers or quickly poach any mild, white -fleshed fish in well -spiced water and wine, let cool in the liquid, then bone. Be careful to not overcook, stop when the flesh is just beyond pink at the backbone. Cut the meat into bite-sized chunks.

Mince scallions, celery, parsley; fresh tarragon, dill or cilantro, salt and pepper and add to olive oil and lemon juice mixed with about ¼ teaspoon of mayonnaise or mustard as an emulsifier. Quickly and lightly turn the fish into the mix and let it marinate for an hour or so in the fridge. It is sometimes made with just oil, lemon and parsley. Try your own mixture. Garnish with tomato quarters and capers.

Shrimp Salad can be made like the fish recipe above, but I prefer the simple method my mother used. She would marinate the cold boiled shrimp in a simple vinaigrette and put it all on a bed of lettuce leaves and sliced tomatoes along with the dressing. This can be garnished with quartered hard – boiled eggs in mayonnaise. The shrimp were highly seasoned in boiling and needed no further additions.

The Pontchartrain Hotel used to make a great crab salad with a light lemon and oil dressing bound with mayonnaise and put into a hollowed cooked artichoke. This was a favorite lunch of CC and friends. Avacados were used when artichokes were not available. Try it.

Since the raw shrimp, or whatever, is always cold, use a large boiler so that the water does not cool. Put enough salt into a copious amount of water to make a brine; add a stalk of celery, and any celery leaves handy, plus an onion – sliced, parsley stems or sprigs and a couple of lemons, sliced. Put in the spices according to the recipe on the box of Zatarain’s mix. Let it all boil together for 20 minutes, then add the shellfish.

Shrimp should cook until they begin floating – just a minute or so after coming back to boiling. Stir them around and pour into a large colander or into a clean sink with a strainer in the drain. Immediately dump plenty of ice cubes on them and stir together, adding more cubes on top. This is to stop the cooking and avoid tough shrimp.

Crabs and crayfish are cooked in a similar way: put them into the boiling seasoned water and when it comes back to a boil, turn off the fire and cover the pot. Let crabs stay for 15 minutes, then test one to see that the meat is all white – not greyish. Test at 5 min for crayfish. Drain and spread the crawfish out to cool and cover with ice to stop the cooking.

Usually the crayfish are served hot, right after draining. They can be accompanied by fresh corn on the cob and red potatoes in their skin. These veggies are boiled in the same water as the crayfish, but started earlier (or after the crayfish are boiled and scooped out of the pot.) and take up the flavor of the seasoning. Remember that corn cooks faster than potatoes.