Crawfish King

When I was asking my friends about American food, some of them told me about cajun food from Louisiana. But I never really had a chance to look into it. Then one day I went to eat crawfish with another Vietnamese friend in the International District. We went to a restaurant called Crawfish King. They had really spicy crawfish cooked with a ton of garlic, a lot of spice, and mixed with sausage, corn and potatoes.


This is my friend and her daughter, wearing a really big bib. And you need the bib because you will get dirty!


The food was really good. We had to peel the crawfish open ourselves, and suck out all the good parts. It was very spicy, and I always think that garlic makes seafood taste and smell better.

I thought it was an Asian restaurant, because I've never seen Americans eat whole shellfish before. But I brought some for my American friend, and when he saw it, he was very excited and shouted "that's cajun food!" I was surprised! The style of food seemed very familiar to me from my home town. How could this kind of food be American?

I found an article about the restaurant in Seattle Weekly. The author said that the style of food is cajun, but the owners are Vietnamese. He had a quote from one of the owners that shocked me:

"You have two cultures whose cuisines are based on rice, spicy food, seafood, and the French influence. The parallels between Louisiana and Vietnam are mind-boggling."

I found a connection between my food and American food! Cajun food is considered one of the most American foods there is, but it was like something from my own home!