Rainbow Trout with Crawdad Risotto!
Heaven. Fresh, wild, stream caught rainbow trout and crawdads. This meal was close to perfection.
Hemali, my wonderful girlfriend, and I decided to head down the coast for some last of the season trout fishing. I recently discovered a stream about 2 hours away which somehow allows anadromous rainbow trout fishing. Yes, a river which can potentially hold steelhead that allows keeping rainbow trout. I was perplexed. No hook restrictions, no bait restrictions. ‘What’s going on?’
I called my local fish and game office to make sure the regulation was correct. I got a hold of their freshwater biologist and we had a nice long talk (I kind of geeked out since I studied freshwater ecology in college). Sure enough, the regulation was correct. It was an old one which still hadn’t changed from they days they stocked this remote stream. He politely asked me to use barbless hooks as a courtesy to these wild, native, trout, and requested I only took what I would eat. “Of course”, I replied.
It was the best trout fishing of my life. Fish every cast. They were all small, except for the one I kept, but I had a blast. How can you complain when you catch at least 20 fish in a single hour?
Hemali, in the meantime, decided to catch a bunch of the crawdads we saw in the stream. When we got home I cooked up this wonderful meal.
| Prep Time | 5 min |
| Cook Time | 1 hour |
| Servings |
people
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- 1 fish Trout Rainbow trout is what we caught!
- At least 6 Crawdad Tails and Claw Meat This is how many we caught, but more would be even better! We also used the claw meat.
- 1/2 Diced Onion
- 1 Bunch Chives
- 1 Cup Rice
- 1 Cup Dry White Wine
- 1/2 Cup Parmesan cheese
- 2 tbsp olive oil
Ingredients
Risotto
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- In a stock pot, boil water. You can add spices to this water to add flavor to the crawdad meat (this stock will also be used for the risotto). Boil enough water to submerge all of your crawdads. When at a rolling boil, add crawdads. Cook for ~5 minutes. When the tail is splitting away from the carapace they are fully cooked.
- Put crawdads in ice water. This supposedly helps the meat peel away from the shell. Save the water as a stock for the risotto.
- In a large pan add olive oil over medium-high heat. When hot add diced onion and cook until fragrant. Add rice and cook until the rice edges have browned.
- Add your wine and stir constantly. Add in salt to taste (salt at this step will let the rice absorb the salt, but you can always add more in at the end).
- Once fully absorbed by the rice, start adding stock 1 cup at a time while stirring, adding in more stock once your previous cup has been absorbed by the rice. (This is the time intensive portion. There is no magic here, just patience. It will pay off!)
- This risotto is finished once the rice is tender. I do not like mine overcooked, so keep trying it after each cup is absorbed until you get your desired texture. Then add Parmesan cheese and stir in. Add crawdad meat and chives to taste (I added a couple of tbsp of chives to mine.) Add salt and pepper to taste.
- Serve hot with fish. I cooked my trout bone in, with blackened seasoning and in oil.
Haha, you know, growing up, my family was poor….And yet, we used to go to the lake and catch crawdads. We would have never imagined eating them! We just had fun catching them as kids. How naïve we all were…
This looks delicious.