Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Day 87

Etouffee & Crawfish Tamale: After a long day on the road coming back from Oxford, MS, I raced as quick as I could over to The Hub Atlanta to check out the "Eat Up: Social Media and the Atlanta Food Scene" panel, which was part of Atlanta Social Media Week. As someone who's new to this game, I wanted to hear a few others speak about the subject. Plus, I also heard that there were going to be some local food vendors there, which never hurts. I hadn't eaten much after being on the road all day, so when the panel was done, I was eager to eat. On the way out, I noticed a vendor called "Blue Tailed Lizard Tamales." (www.bluetailedlizard.com). I'd never heard of them, but I love tamales any way I can get them. I've had the usual versions with chicken, shrimp, pork, etc., but never this version featuring etouffee and crawfish. I was hungry, so I ordered one up.
I've never had etouffee, so I hoped this tamale would offer a few new flavors for me. According to Wikipedia, etouffee is a "Cajun dish typically served with shellfish or chicken over rice and is similar to gumbo." These tamales were already removed from the husk, and were served with a little bit of Mexican crema. With my first bite, I noticed that the masa was nice and moist, which is always a plus. The etouffee & crawfish filling provided a nice salty contrast to the masa, but I couldn't quite tell if the etouffee/crawfish were blended in with each other or not. Either way, it was really tasty, and I could have gladly eaten about 5 more of them.

Based on this tamale, I'm going to have to find somewhere in ATL to try etouffee by itself. Any recommendations?
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3 comments:

  1. davidhiNovember 13, 2010 at 2:04 AM

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  2. davidhiNovember 13, 2010 at 2:05 AM

    I never had much cajun food in Atlanta, but I've had reasonable etouffee at Pappadeaux and Copeland's -- there are multiple locations of each, but both that I tried were right around 75/285. Both are chains, so maybe not the most authentic NOLA experience, but not Popeyes either (no joke -- Popeyes has crawfish etouffee as a limited-time item till Nov. 28th -- haven't tried it myself; perhaps it could make a daily entry).

    IMO, of the two I've been to above, Pappadeaux is the better restaurant in general and actually pretty good for a chain, but I pretty much stick to their giant plates of fried sea critters.

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  3. AnonymousAugust 18, 2011 at 1:37 PM

    etouffee is pretty easy and fast to make. You can buy frozen crawfish tails at Publix!

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