Dish of Crawfish Salad
(click to enlarge)

Crawfish Salad


USA Louisiana
Makes:
Effort:
Sched:
DoAhead:  		 1 #
**
2 hrs
Best		 A popular Louisiana Salad, made with some variation. If you don't live among the Bayous, see Comments.

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Crawfish Tails (1)  
--Dressing
Lemon Juice
Scallion whites
Parsley
Capers
Mayonnaise
Creole Mustard (2)
Wine, Dry White
Pepper, black
Hot Sauce (3)
-- Serve on
Lettuce Leaves
Make   -   (1-1/2 hrs shucking crawfish tails, 25 min to make salad)
  1. Shell and de-vein CRAWFISH TAILS as needed.
  2. Squeeze LEMON JUICE.
  3. Chop SCALIONS fine, white only. Chop PARSLEY fine, Mix.
  4. Drain CAPERS.
  5. In a large mixing bowl, combine all Dressing items until evenly distributed.
  6. Fold Crawfish into the dressing.
  7. Refrigerate until needed. Some rest time improves it. It can be held refrigerated in a sealed container for a couple of days.
  8. Serve cold over Lettuce (see Serving).
NOTES:

  1. Crawfish Tails:

      Weight is cooked shelled tail meat. You would need around 8 pounds of live crawfish for this weight. Consider Shrimp instead.

  2. Creole Mustard:

      This can be purchased, but is much better made by our recipe Creole Mustard.

  3. Hot Sauce:

      To use or not and how much is up to your best judgement - I got no complaints with 1/2 teaspoon. Suitable brands are Crystal, Tabasco, and Louisiana.

  4. Serving:

      For table service, individual bowls are usually lined with Lettuce Leaves. For buffet service it is better to tear up the lettuce into about 2 inch pieces and line the serving bowl with those. That way guests who want lettuce with their salad can scoop some up.

  5. Comments:

      Crawfish are not much available here in Southern California, except from China (the world's largest supplier of Crawfish). They are usually cooked and frozen in 5 pound bags, sometimes live. I bought a 5 pound bag for 2026 US $23. There were 150 of them in the bag, and it took me 1-1/2 hours to shuck the tails. That produced only 10 ounces, and they were bland! No way I was going to spend the time, money, and another trip to San Gabriel for another bag, so I filled out the pound with much more flavorful Shrimp. One of the guests liked the texture of the Crayfish Tails, but couldn't say much about the taste due to the dressing and Shrimp.

    A friend found these in a Chinese Buffet and took a few. He tried one and found it so bland and disappointing he tossed the rest out and went back for more Crab Legs. Now I can't say live wild Louisiana Crawfish are this disappointing, but there is no affordable way for me to find out.

  6. U.S. measure: t=teaspoon, T=Tablespoon, c=cup, qt=quart, oz=ounce, #=pound, cl=clove in=inch ar=as required tt=to taste
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