2018 Ticket Sales

TICKET SALES FOR THE 

2018 ARIZONA CRAWFISH FESTIVAL

ARE NOW CLOSED!!!!!!!!!
You can still purchase tickets at the gate - so come join us for a great day! 

Saturday, July 21st 10:00AM - 8:00PM
Food will be served starting at 12pm

Bison Ranch in Heber-Overgarrd, Az.

Prices for the 2018 Crawfish Festival will be as follows:

Festival Entrance and Crawfish : 
This includes your entrance to the festival as well as one boat of crawfish! One boat of crawfish contains approximately 3lb of crawfish along with veggies to include corn and potatoes cooked with the same great flavor as the crawfish!

Festival Entrance : $5
This cost is for those who do not want crawfish but still want to come out and have some fun! There will be live music, bounce houses for kids, the Taylor Family Circus who provide balloon animals and face painting free of charge! And yes, both children and adults can get in on the face painting and balloons! :-)

Sampler Crawfish Plate : 
This is great for those who are unsure what crawfish are and if they like them or not! You will receive approximately 1lb of crawfish and no veggies.

Extra Crawfish Boat : 
For those of you who want more than one boat of crawfish this option is for you! Add as many EXTRA boats of crawfish as you want! This will be an extra full boat of crawfish (approximately 3lb) plus the veggies!

Extra Veggie Plate : 
For those of you asking for extra corn and potatoes last year - we listened! Here is a way to make sure you get all the corn and potatoes you want! This will not include any crawfish but will give you an extra corn and potato.


We will have a list of names at both entrances so you do not need to worry about having a receipt.

To keep up with event details, you can follow along on our Facebook Fan Page, Event Page.

For questions or special requests, please email us at arizonacrawfishco@gmail.com. See y'all there!

!~Laissez les bons temps rouler~!

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Crawfish Trapping Report - Goldwater Lake

Crawfish 1

Last weekend Bobby & Sabrina took Crawfish 1 out for it's madden trapping voyage to one of our favorite Arizona lakes to trap, Goldwater Lake in Prescott. This is the earliest in the year we have ever trapped and the first time we have trapped crawfish in Arizona still hosting eggs. We posted a picture Sunday on Facebook; of the comments we received "redneck caviar" was the winner in our book.

Now without further ado, here is the first Arizona Crawfish Trapping report of 2015!

Crawfish eggs

Date: March 14th & 15th, 2015
Bait: Processed Crawfish Bait
Traps: 10 Promar 502 crawfish traps.
Trap Depth: 10-20 feet
Water Temperature: Unknown
Average Time In Water: Overnight /  Noon Saturday - 10:00AM Sunday
Trapping Results: 20 lbs.

Additional Notes: We don't mind when people find our traps and pull them up to inspect out of curiosity and we always appreciate when you have the character to not steal them. However, we do ask you have the courtesy of returned the taps to the water instead of leaving them toss on the bank. Merci!

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Crawfish Festival Lodging

Lodging Options for the Crawfish Festival

Here are the local listing we have found and last years' attendees have stayed at. If you know of one we are missing, email a request listing to arizonacrawfishco@gmail.com.

Best Western Sawmill Inn
928-535-5053
1877 highway 260
Heber, Az 85928

Big Pine Resort
928-535-5649
PO Box 1408
Overgaard, Az 85933

Buckskin Lodge
928-535-4598 1842
Highway 260
Heber, Arizona 85928
info@buckskinlodge.com

Mogollon Resort Cabins
928-535-3250
Across from Bison Ranch
resortcabin@aol.com

Overgaard All Season Lodge
480-435-4222
2684 Lodge Loop
Overgaard, Az 85933
allseasonlodge@gmail.com

Resort Cabin Service
602-284-7207
At Bison Ranch
resortcabin@aol.com

Rustic Rim Hideaway
928-535-9030
910 N Muke Springs Trail
Forest Lakes, Az 85822

Yost Stephen
480-703-7990
At Bison Ranch

Kohles Ranch
928-478-4211
202 South Kohl's Ranch Lodge Road

Mazatzal Casino
928-474-6044
Hwy 87 MP 251
Payson, AZ 85547
http://www.mazatzal-casino.com/index.php/hotel

Hon-Dah Casino
928-369-7562
777 Arizona 260
Pinetop, AZ 85935
http://www.hon-dah.com/

Shrimp & Grits

I’m sure like many of you reading this; you grew up on grits as a regular part of your family’s weekly diet and thinking nothing of it. That is until Joe Pesci’s unforgettable performance in “My Cousin Vinny” when he tries grits for the first time. Now it’s nearly impossible to make, cook or think about grits without hearing Joe Pesci in the back of my mind asking, “what IS a grit?” Here is one of our personal grit favorites…and if you really want to top is off, garnish with crawfish tails prior to serving.

Shrimp & Grits 

Serving Size: 4

Ingredients: 
1 pound medium-size fresh shrimp, peeled (and deveined, if desired)
6 slices of bacon

Peanut oil
2 cups sliced fresh white mushrooms
1 cup slices scallions (green onions)
1 large clove garlic, crush through a garlic press
4 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Dash of Tabasco sauce
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 recipe of hot, Cheese Grits. (There is a recipe on page 23 of this book if you do not have a cheese grits recipe).

Directions: 
1. Rinse the shrimp and pat dry on paper towels. Set Aside.
2. Dice the bacon and fry lightly in a large skillet until browned at the edges but not too crisp. Drain the bacon on paper towels and set aside.
3. Add enough oil to the fat in the skillet to make a thin layer. Heat over medium-high heat until the fat is quite hot. Add the shrimp and cook until they begin to color. Add the mushrooms and sauté, stirring frequently, about 4 minutes. Sprinkle with scallions and bacon, then add garlic. Season with lemon juice, Tabasco, parsley, salt, and pepper.
4. Divide the grits among four warm plates. Spoon the shrimp mixture over top and serve immediately.

Source: Good Old Grits Cookbook by Bill Neal & David Perry

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Boiled Crawfish

There ain’t a Cajun alive that can’t tell you how to boil crawfish! Exact vegetable contents, boiling methods, seasoning amount and steam time will vary per family/farm, but it all starts the same with ‘as many (crawfish) as you can get!”

Boiled Crawfish

Serving Size: 2 – 4 pounds per person. 5 – 8 pounds per Cajun.

Ingredients: 
Live Crawfish (as many as you can get)
Louisiana Fish Fry’s Crawfish, Crab & Shrimp Boil “pour & boil” & “liquid boil”
Seasoning to taste. Tony Chachere’s or Slap ya’ Mama
Garlic to taste
Butter, two sticks per “drop”
Lemons, five per “drop”
Red Potato’s, one - two per person
Onions, one per person
Corn, one full stock per 2 pounds of crawfish

Other desired ingredients can be added. Sausage, shrimp, crab, radish, asparagus and okra are all common additions. Make sure you add a balance amount to your other ingredients and DO NOT over-fill your boiling pot.



Directions: 
In your boiling pot, fill with water ¾ of the way up basket (not the pot itself). Turn heat on and just before the water starts to boil, add liquid and granular seasoning to taste, butter, garlic and five lemons cut in half and squeezed into the water. When water boils add potatoes and peeled onions. Once potatoes start to soften add the crawfish and corn and bring back to a boil. (Never fill the basket more than ¾ full). Kill the gas and allow to soak for a few moments. Remove the basket and pour all contents into an ice chest, cover in granular seasoning, close lid, shake well and allow to steam for up to 20 minutes before serving. Repeat each “drop” until all the crawfish are gone.

Source: Any coonass you ask!

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Crawfish Trapping Report - Rim Lakes

This week's crawfish trapping report is a little different and holds a little more significance than usual. Generally we highlight one specific location and the trapping time is generally in the range of six - eight hours...but that's recreational trapping. The trapping this week is for the 2013 Arizona Crawfish Festival at Bison Ranch on Saturday August 10th and lots of folks are counting on a taste of these crawfish! They are free to festival attendees on a "first come, first served" basis in an effort to education Arizona outdoor conservationists on the destructive damage these critters can have to our natural waterways. If you're of the Cajun decent, or a crawfish connoisseur, and you would like a little more than a "taste" at the festival, you can pre-purchase festival tickets to reserve a minimum of 3 pounds of boiled crawfish through Thursday, August 8th online at ArizonaCrawfishCompany.com/events.

It's the belief of Arizona Crawfish Company that with a little education on the culinary delight of crawfish and a little help getting set up to trap in Arizona, lake goers, fisherman and people just looking for a little family fun, we can put a significant reduction on the population of crawfish in Arizona!

Date: August 5th - 6th, 2013
Location: Willow Spring Lake
Bait: Processed Crawfish Bait
Traps: Trap Type: Combination of fifty Promar 501 & Promar 502 traps.
Trap Depth: 8 - 15 foot average
Water Temperature: Unknown.
Average Time In Water: 9 hours between morning and evening pick up. 15 hours on overnight pick up.
Trapping Results: Estimated pounds per pick up: 1 - 3 per trap.
Lagniappe: Total number of beers consumed - All of them.

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Fried Crawfish

Straight from the heart of Louisiana’s Crawfish Capitol and host of the annual, world famous Breaux Bridge Crawfish Festival…some good ole fried crawfish. C’est Bon cher!

Fried Crawfish 

Serving Size: 2 – 4 pounds per person…5 – 8 pounds per Cajun.

Ingredients: 
1 pound of cleaned crawfish tails
Salt & red pepper to taste
2 eggs
2 cups of milk
salt & pepper
1 ½ cups of flour
Crisco shortening for frying

Directions:
 Preheat the oil 375 degrees. Season the crawfish tails with salt and red pepper to your taste, and set them aside. Beat the eggs well, add the milk, salt and pepper and beat the mixture together. Put the crawfish tails into the four which you have put into a large bowl, and coat them well. Then put the crawfish into the egg mixture. Take the crawfish out of the mixture one by one and put them into the flour again, and coat the crawfish well, with the flour. Drop the crawfish into the hot shortening one by one. Fry the crawfish until the outside is crisp, about 5 minutes. Serve at once.

Source: The La Meilleure cook book by Jude Theriot credits this recipe to: Roy & Thelma Pontiff of Thelma’s Restaurant in Breaux Bridge, La.

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