It’s crawfish time in New Orleans! Spring weather means you’ll hear the roar of crawfish pots being fired up around the city. NOLA.com’s Ian McNulty spoke to WWL’s Tommy Tucker and emphasized how the whole process of a boil is uniquely put together to help form a communal bond.
“It’s more than that morsel of meat in the shell. There’s a framework of togetherness built in. That’s something you should pay attention to when you go to a boil. The pace is slow. You can only cook crawfish so fast; the batch has to soak, and then you can only eat so fast. Within that is this mandate to slow down and be together, which is increasingly rare in our world and our times,” McNulty points out.
McNulty goes on to say the gathering around the table with friends and family builds an almost tribal sense of togetherness that harkens back to eras long since gone. “Within the meal is this mandate to slow down and be together. That is increasingly rare in our world and our times,” he emphasized. “In other times, in other cultures, they would build temples and statues to represent something that powerful. Here? We just get another round, crack ‘em open, and dig in,” McNulty added. Louisiana is a unique place with a unique way of life. The good times behind the table can be just as important as what’s being eaten on it.