Cape Point Crayfishing

A little while ago I was lucky enough to hop on a boat and go crayfishing along the rocky coastline of Cape Point Nature Reserve.  The location is fantastic, not just because of the abundance of the crustaceans but also because it's a seriously beautiful part of South Africa. 

For those of you who've never been crayfishing in a boat before, here's a quick lesson.  Take a ring, roughly 50cm wide, attached to a net, a float, and a bait bag in the middle.  Fill the bait bag with old anchovies, or something similarly pungent, and drop the whole contraption into the water.  The ring drops down onto the sea bed, bait bag centred and net spread out below.  The float remains on the surface, enabling one to retrieve the whole lot later (a fairly important part of the procedure).  The anchovies (etc) are left for around 10 minutes to work there magic and then the whole lot is pulled at a good speed out of the water.  There are strict regulations as to how many and what size crayfish can be taken home, and this must be having the intended effect because every bag was absolutely full of them. 

The best thing about pulling crayfish yourself is that less than an hour later you can be happily biting into the little guys.  However you want to cook them, boiled, barbecued or in the oven, you're in for a wonderful meal.  Drizzled with some good olive oil or garlic butter, served with rice, a bit of fresh bread and salad, crayfish as fresh as that cannot be beaten.