Homemade Linguine with Crawfish and Herbed Cream Sauce

By tulawdog

Ingredients

• 3-4 pounds of crawfish in their shells
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup tomato paste
• 2 large plum tomatoes, chopped (set aside diced tomatoes for garnish)
• 1/2 cup dry white wine
• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
• 2 garlic cloves, sliced
• 2 sprigs fresh tarragon sprigs
• 2 fresh thyme sprigs
• 2 fresh Italian parsley sprigs
• 2 cups whipping cream
• 1 1/2 pounds fettucine or linguine

Preparation

Step 1

Bring very large pot of salted water to boil. Add crawfish. Boil until cooked through, about 12 minutes (or cook in batches, if necessary). Using tongs, transfer crawfish to large rimmed baking sheet. Remove meat from tail and claws; place meat in medium bowl. Cover and chill meat. Reserve bodies and shells.
Heat oil in heavy large pot over high heat. Add reserved crawfish bodies and shells (not the crawfish meat...just the shells!). Sauté 3 minutes. Reduce heat to low. Add tomato paste; stir 3 minutes. Stir in tomatoes, wine, vinegar, garlic, tarragon, thyme, and parsley. Add cream; boil 2 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-low. Simmer just until crawfish flavor infuses cream, stirring occasionally, about 20 minutes. Strain sauce into large bowl, pressing on solids to extract as much liquid as possible. Discard contents of strainer. (Crawfish and sauce can be prepared 1 day ahead. Cover separately and chill.)
Transfer sauce to heavy large saucepan. Add crawfish to sauce. {Snippet's Notes: I reserved some crawfish to add to the pasta dish as a garnish.} Gently rewarm over low heat, stirring occasionally.


Meanwhile, cook pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until just tender but still firm to bite, stirring occasionally. Drain; return pasta to pot. Add sauce; toss over medium-high heat until sauce coats pasta, about 4 minutes. Garnish with diced tomato and chopped tarragon. Season with salt and pepper. Transfer to large shallow bowl and serve.