Cullen's Crawfish on the Rock
1/4 cup Peanut oil
1/4 lb Butter
2 cup Onions, finely chopped
3/4 cup Celery, finely chopped
1/2 cup Bell pepper, finely chopped
1/2 cup Fresh parsley, chopped
4 x Garlic cloves, finely minced
1/4 cup Green onions, finely sliced
3 cup Evaporated milk
1/2 cup Madeira wine
1 cup chicken broth
1 lb Cream cheese, chunked
3 lb Crawfish tails and fat
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Black pepper
1/2 tsp Granulated garlic
1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper
2 can Crescent dinner rolls
Method:
First, put the peanut oil and the butter in a heavy 12-inch skillet and melt it
down over medium heat until it just begins to foam. Then stir in the onions,
celery, bell pepper, parsley, garlic, and green onions and cook them for about
12 to 15 minutes until they soften completely. While the chopped vegetables are
simmering, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
When the vegetables are ready, pour in the evaporated milk, Madeira wine, and
chicken broth, mix them together thoroughly, and bring the mixture to a slow
boil. Then drop in the cream cheese chunks and, with the heat still set at
medium, stir until the cheese melts and the sauce turns smooth and silky. For
the most part, this should take you about 5 minutes.
At this point, fold the crawfish tails into the hot sauce in the skillet, stir
everything together thoroughly, and cook the mixture for 3 minutes.
When uniformly blended, sprinkle on and stir in the salt, black pepper,
granulated garlic, and cayenne. Then take the pan off the fire and allow the
mixture to cool slightly.
Actually, if you want to develop the maximum flavor in the seafood mix, I
recommend that you make the dish one day, cover it and place it in the
refrigerator overnight, and reheat it the next day just before you serve it.
Just be careful not to recook - you don't want the crawfish tails to turn into
rubber bands! Truthfully, though, this is so good that'll probably never happen.
Then 14 minutes before you're ready to eat, unroll the dinner rolls into
triangles. And with a chef's knife, cut out 1/2 inch squares. Then bake the
squares for about 12 to 14 minutes in the oven. These are your "rocks"
and you want them to puff and turn a rich, toasty-brown color.
When you're ready to eat, drop the "rocks" into a soupbowl, generously
ladle the crawfish over the top, and serve piping hot alongside a cold salad
made with sliced tomatoes, advocado chunks, chopped onions, artichoke hearts,
hearts of palm, and a dressing made from the artichoke marinade.
This dish can be served family style as an everday meal or as the entree for the
most elegant, sophisticated dinner party.
Chef's Note: If you want to make the mixture kinda spicy, instead of using just
the cream cheese and the cayenne, you can drop in a couple of tablespoons of
jalapeno peppers. Experiment with different mixtures. In addition to crawfish
tails, make the basic sauce and substitute shrimp, crabmeat, broiled oysters,
Italian sausage and mozzarella, smoked turkey, chopped chicken or ham and bacon.
The variations you can come up with are endless
1851
Herman Melville's Moby-Dick.