Crawdads, a.k.a. crayfish, crawfish, or mudbugs, are tiny freshwater crustaceans built on the plan of lobsters. In the U.S. they are most associated with the Mississippi River delta, in Louisiana. 90% of the world’s crawdads come from Louisiana, but they are eaten worldwide, with Scandinavians especially fond of them. Not so many people know that California has a delta, but the crawdads know it. We traveled to Isleton in the heart of the Sacramento River Delta to sample a bucket of them.

Isleton hosts a Crawdad Festival in June, but we figured that with 200,000 extra people in the town of 800, parking might be a problem. Parking was not a problem on a rainy mid-winter weekend. We parked right across from Isleton Joe’s.

Isleton is near San Francisco, but the Delta is another world. Suburban strip malls are suddenly replaced by farm fields and waterways, with a collector’s assortment of bridges interconnecting the reclaimed islands. The land is well below the tops of earthen levees that hold back the river. There seems to be a reluctance to build anything too spiffy in places that might go aquarium on short notice. It’s a nostalgic antidote to suburbia.

Getting down to business, the three pound bowl comes with soup and bread. If three pounds seems like a lot for two people, don’t worry. Crawdads have very little meat. Only the tails have enough meat to be worthwhile. It’s possible that the work of shucking them may make them a net negative calorie food. The thrill of conquest and consumption makes up for it.

The crawdads are cooked in a thin broth spiced with what tasted like cayenne pepper. The broth was perfect, not too hot and the right complement to the sweet meat. Beer was more popular than crawdads at mid-afternoon, but the staff did a fine job of looking after our mudbug needs.

Scandinavians are said to like them cooked with salt, sugar, ale, and dill flowers and served cold. Cajuns cook them with lots of spices and put them into jamabalaya and all the other things that Cajuns put things into.

Crawfish are available live and frozen from Internet merchants. Sources include Authentic Lousiana Seafood, Lousiana Crawfish Co, and Live Crawfish for Sale.