Finally Friday! And not just any Friday, but crayfish-party-Friday! Some of our friends have put together a crayfish party, which will be the first (and probably only one) that I attend this year.
I have to say that I’m a huge fan of crayfish parties. It has nothing to do with crayfishes although they are of course yummy too, but I especially enjoy the simplicity of these parties. You come, you eat, you sing, you drink. You eat some more, sing some more and have a few "snaps" (not the sweet, peach stuff, no no, here we are talking Akvavit –something I don’t even like but at these parties it’s kind of fun) and that’s probably when the singing really takes off. Oh, and you do all of this while wearing funny hats (if you’re in that mood, I have to confess that I personally tend to skip those). Sweden isn’t really rich when it comes to festivals and stuff (ehhh) but got to love the yearly crayfish parties that take place every year in August.
Someone recently asked me why we have these crayfish parties, and I caught myself not really being able to answer. Was it so that the crayfish parties to Swedes were something like Thanksgiving to Americans, my friend wondered? Ehh…. Not really. Rather, I think it has something to do with the fact that crayfish harvesting in Sweden was, for most of the 20th century, legally limited to late summer, and people therefore thought of turning it into a party when they were finally allowed to harvest. Or something like that?!
Anyways, whatever excuse there is to celebrate, I tend to embrace it. Have a great Friday everyone!
Crucial part of the party part one: Singing
Crucial part of the party part two: snaps-ing
10 comments:
Oh! That's interesting :D Learned something new.
Wow, a bottle of Jagermeister on the table.. and its daylight out!!
haha, those people can party!
One of the best things I found in Sweden, reminds me of Chinese spicy crayfish a lot.
kanmuri -u have to try one in real life and you'll learn more :)
Hopfrog -haha, f course. And remember, during summer in Sweden it doesn't get dark until pretty late... in August it's still bright outside until at least 9pm
Zhe -glad to hear that!
Hello from London!
Crayfish party sounds like fun to me!
Do you have to get drunk before singing? Ha ha...
I think it's better that way, then you cannot remember how awful you actually are! Ha...
So crayfish is crawfish. But those crayfish in your pictures look like small lobsters. We have a lot of crawfish from Louisana in the U.S. Most people don't eat them. I am curois to know if crayfish in Sweden much bigger than the crawfish in LA. Wikipedia says they are the same thing. Your pictures look different.
londoncalling -they are fun parties indeed! :) Well, it is not like u have to be drunk to sing, but most of the songs are so silly that being drunk makes it a little bit easier to sing them...
Anonymous -Swedish or Finnish crayfishes are much bigger than American/Chinese/Spanish ones, but most people still don't buy them because they are too expensive. And on big crayfish parties u need a lot of crayfish so it would simply be too expensive to provide everybody with the best stuff. At the party where I went yesterday we ate Spanish ones...
Can you get cray fish in northern China or is this a Southern thing? I make a trip to New Orleans during the crawl fish season every year just for that, but would love to find the Chinese version next time I am there. Crayfish always reminds me of New Orleans, one of my favorite places in this whole world.
I can't see them in your pictures. How small are they? The ones in Aus get as big as a dog, but I don't think they are the same thing.
Are they prawns or yabbies?
anon -when I was in Dalian in Nov 2008 I saw people eating large crayfishes in restaurants.. so one would think the answer to your question is yes. I am no expert though...
Jim- they are not prawn... more like yabbies then I'd say. The ones on these photos are Chinese ones. When we have crayfish parties in Sweden we cannot afford buying Swedish ones, they are really big and tasty but simply too expensive, seeing that we are quite some people at our parties and that we all eat a lot of them... Most Swedes (unless the King, the Queen and the loaded ones) buy Chinese/Spanish/Turkish crayfishes as the local ones are so expensive.
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