SUBMISSION Thread for the F&DB Crawfish Challenge

Crawfish Cheesecake

Crust:
1 cup almond flour
1 cup grated Parmigiana Reggiano
1 egg
1/3 cup butter, melted

Combine ingredients and press into a springform pan. Bake for ten minutes in 350 degree oven. Cool.

Filling:
1 pound of Louisiana crawfish tails
Finely diced onion, 1/2 a red bell pepper, garlic, 2 jalapeños
24 oz softened cream cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
3 eggs
Seasoning to taste



Sauté the veggies in butter or olive oil until softened. Add crawfish to combine. Season. Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine softened cream cheese and sour cream until blended together, using a mixer, or by hand if the cream cheese is soft enough. Just make sure it’s well combined. Add eggs, one at a time, until thoroughly mixed. Season well. Add crawfish and veg mixture and thoroughly combine again.

Pour mixture over the cooled crust, and place pan into a roasting pan and add water to the roasting pan, about halfway up. Bake the cheesecake in the water bath for an hour at 350, or until there is just a wobble in the center. Remove from oven and cool on rack for at least an hour, and then refrigerate for 3 or four hours (or 24) before removing from springform pan.

Slice and serve, preferably with good crackers to eat as an appetizer or light meal.













I made this twice, the first time with four slices of bacon, diced, sautéing the veg in the bacon grease, and using only 2 cups of crawfish tails. After tasting, I decided it needed more seasoning, a second jalapeño, a whole pound of crawfish instead of just 2 cups, and also decided that the bacon was unnecessary. I retook some photos the second round, but not the ingredient photo.

ETA: I completely forgot that I also added this shredded cheese. All 8 oz. Not a ton of cheese, but just enough, imo.

Pretty sure we can stop here. WOW. DROOL. YUM.

Some of the recipes/items y’all post on here are legit unreal. That looks amazing

Congrats on the win

Both dishes submitted so far look great.

This is why I love this challenge. I personally do not like crawfish, but looking at the photos can tell both dishes were probably fantastic.

Good grief that looks soooo good!

that looks unbelievable

I guess I won't be picking up some frozen Indonesian crawfish tails on the way home... thanks Darla and No8, your dazzling entries have saved me both time and money and most of all, embarrassment.

crawfish bisque

crawfish tails - 3 lbs.
crawfish shells - 50 stuffed heads
onion, garlic, green onions - cooked down
butter, bread crumbs, flour
home made roux
leftover crawfish shells for the stock
seasoning - my own blend




When cooking, I don't measure amounts as I just wing it based on taste and texture. First thing was obviously boil crawfish and save the leftovers. Use shells for stock. Save heads and clean, set aside. I cooked down the onions and garlic until translucent. Then added a little butter, bread crumbs, crawfish tails there were minced in the food processor. Added little stock to keep the stuffing moist before inserting into the shells. Stuffed shells were when dusted in flour and baked.

Made the home made roux, and added the seafood stock for desired consistency. Seasoned as needed. The baked stuffed crawfish head shells were added into the roux and cooked over medium heat for 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes. The crawfish tails were then added for the last 5-10 minutes, and heat was turned down to a low simmer (2-3 setting on your stove).

I used 3 medium onions for the roux, and 1 cooked down onion for the stuffing.


First batch of 24-25 stuffed heads , prior to flour and baking.


the large Magnalite (4267) was 3/4 full of goodness, pic showing the last remains

aaaaaand just noticed the fleur de lis plating accoutrement