Fast forward a few years to the Grand Lake Market in Oakland. We spotted another crayfish vendor, but this time we subdued our long enough to ask an important question.

"How do you cook them?"

The farmer working the stand, which also offers less mobile shellfish, gave us a simple answer: Bring water to a rolling boil, add the crayfish (or crawfish, or crawdads, or crawdaddies, all of which, like crab, descend from the Indo-European gerbh, to scratch or carve), and when the water comes to a boil again, they're ready to go.

Photos by Melissa Schneider.

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