LA Crawfish — Restaurant in Houston

Disclaimer: Both locations have great reviews; so, I plan to come back and try again.

My first experience was definitely lacking, unfortunately. First off, my girlfriend and I have been jonesing for boiled crawfish for nearly 9 months. We know there's a season and we know we're a little early for it. However, LA Crawfish was rumored to actually have live crawfish, albeit small. We figured we could handle small; so, we headed over. My girlfriend is super friendly and decides to chat up the cashier with "How big are your crawfish? Are they teeny tiny"? He responds with, "they're about this (displays space between thumb and index finger.) The freeze has been really hard and they haven't been shipping us live ones. These are a bit bigger because they're frozen." EEK! The problem is, we had already ordered and paid. What were we to do?

So, we went over to the spice bar (super cool) and got ourselves all stocked up ready for a crawfishpalooza! Our crawfish arrived and well, they were just like frozen tails, only in the shell. They were rubbery and fishy - not yummy.

Another thing to note: LA Crawfish is a really simple operation. You order at a counter and seat yourself. They don't use buckets with the crawfish; rather they're served in a plastic bag that, I think, you're supposed to dump out on the table - the very table you have draped with the plastic tablecloth they provide you at the counter. We also cleared our own table because leaving a pile of shells there just seemed weird. So, considering the minimal overhead and the amount of work the patron does, perhaps the price could be a bit lower. Sure, the going rate is $7/lb, but every restaurant/bar that I've ever ordered boiled crawfish had servers, backwaiters or bussers. Even Rajun Cajun has someone to clear the table despite it being a counter service establishment.

I'll swing back by once season is in full swing and maybe the experience...

Being from Nawlin’s, I can humbly say that I have a trained palate in good ole fashion mudbugs. Ive been eating them since my mom had me in a stroller. As you see, my homeboy and I tore that food up! Below is a review of such.

Crawfish: [8/10] We ordered the garlic & Cajun mix. The flavor of the paws, shell (garlic spiced), heads (sweet), and tails were really good. It is rare to find crawfish that has a complete spice and flavor. The meat in the tail tasted better than most crawfish places.

I don’t rate it a 10 because of two issues. The crawfish was overcooked. You know how crawfish can become a deep red and the shell can become hard? It was like that. They cooked them too long. And the flavor of the tail meat, was not how I wanted it. Admittedly, it is hard to have a very good flavor of tail meat. But I have seen it done. The LA Crawfish in Bellaire is like that.

Pho (8/10) I had the spicy beef broth, while my friend had the crawfish broth. The broth was sooooo good., i took it home. The best I’ve ever had at any restaurant. The spicy elixir had my noise bleeding, like i was transported to the high elevation of Mont Everest. The meat was standard.

I don’t rate it a 10, because they jipped me on the meat portion. There was so little meat i had to ration it. The noodles were okay, they didn’t taste home made or fresh as other pho places.

Music: explicit music when I was there.

Overall: the food and experience was very pleasant. And i will go back...

Bowls of Pho start at $7.99, as of February 2020.

Tried the Chicken Pho Bowl. I’m not a pho connoisseur. Please keep that in mind when considering my review.

Approximately 15 minutes after placing my order at the counter, the bowl was brought to my table. It came with the usual side of bean sprouts and other fresh herbs. The soup came out steaming hot. Had to let it cool for a few. The broth, which from my understanding is supposed to be key to this staple Vietnamese noodle soup, was lacking in flavor. So looking at it from two perspectives. On one hand it tasted like a lite and clean chicken broth. On the other hand, it didn’t have a full and bold taste. Regarding portions, this restaurant seemed to skimp on the rice noodles. I finished them before the meat. The chicken was so so.

I don’t want to give the impression that this was a bad experience. I would definitely revisit this restaurant. What I’d like to convey is that sometimes the saying is true that “you get what you pay for”. A $8 bowl of pho at La Crawfish might taste bland compared to a $15 bowl at other restaurants.

Other observations. Expect a line out the door during crawfish season. The dining room can feel cramped during peak...