Crawfish-Inspired Catering Ideas for Events

If you're hosting an event with a Louisiana or Mardi Gras theme, give the special occasion an authentic and tasty touch with a variety of crawfish dishes on the menu. Louisiana is known for its delicious and flavorful crawfish-based cuisine, including appetizers and entrees, which are sure to please your guests. 

To save time in the kitchen, hire a professional caterer to create a selection of authentic crawfish menu items for you and your guests to enjoy. If you're on a tight event-planning budget, you can have catering company create just the appetizers or entrees, and you can make the rest. Consider hiring a local restaurant that specializes in Cajun and Creole cuisine to cater the event for you. 

Here are some mouthwatering crawfish-inspired dishes to put on your party menu:

Appetizers 

1. Hot Crawfish Dip: Get the party started on a delicious note by serving guests hot crawfish dip soon after they arrive. The rich dip has a cream cheese base and is flavored with Cajun spices, onions, garlic, bell peppers and pimientos. Mix in the peeled crawfish tails and serve with loaves of warm, crusty French or Italian bread.

As an alternative, mix Cajun spice-seasoned crawfish tails into your favorite creamy queso dip, and serve with tortilla chips. 

2. Crawfish Cakes: Ask the caterer to make crab cakes featuring crawfish tails as well as crab. Serve this tasty twist on an appetizer classic with spicy remoulade sauce either drizzled over the tops of the cakes or on the side. They also pair well with spicy Creole mustard.

Entrees 

1. Crawfish Etouffee: No Lousiana-themed event would be complete with steaming bowls of crawfish etouffee, which is a thick, creamy stew filled with crawfish tails, bell peppers and green onions. Crawfish etouffee begins with a roux similar to gumbo, but features a more golden-color sauce. Serve the etouffee in bowls over white rice. 

2. Crawfish Po-Boys: Lousiana is known for its po-boy sandwiches, which feature crusty French bread stuffed with different types of fried seafood. Fill your po-boys with crunchy fried crawfish tails, along with shredded lettuce, pickles, tomatoes and mayonnaise like they do in local Louisiana restaurants. 

As you can see, there are many ways you can incorporate crawfish into your appetizers or entrees for your next big event. To learn more about these and other options, be sure to reach out to local crawfish restaurants such as The Crawfish Man.