Dishes where tails are left on the shrimp

Are you supposed to eat the tail? I had a lovely cajun styled shrimp, crawfish and fish dish, but the tails were left on the shrimp. I was very confused about how to eat this dish. Not knowing what to do, I used a knife and fork and cut the tails off.

• You pull the tails off or cut them off. The shrimp make a prettier presentation with their tails on. Also shells can add to the flavor of the dish. Not because you eat them but because you cook with them.

• I like to pry every bit of meat I can from the tail so not to waste any. I love shrimp!

  Shrimpavore

• You can eat it but it's not very tasty. Pull the tails off with your fingers then suck the juicy goodness out of the tail. Same applies to heads left on.

• I remember the first time I ordered a dish with shrimp in Italy, and they came with the heads still on. I'd never seen a shrimp with eyes before. I thought they were decorative capers or something.

• If you pull off the tail and it still sticks to the shell, the shrimp is overcooked.

• Are you fucking retarded, OP?

• Well, shrimp or not, I ALWAYS love to suck the tail and heads for ALL the flavor! I do prefer beef to shrimp.

• If you order amaebi (freshwater shrimp) in a sushi restaurant they will serve you the shrimp meat the same way they would salt water shrimp sushi. However, they will also serve you the rest of the shrimp (eye balls and all) tempura battered and fried. And if somebody fried a fisherman's toe nail clippings in tempura batter, I'd imagine it would taste the same. I highly recommend amaebi. Skip the fried shrimp shells.

• There is one place in Chinatown where I can get living shrimp. I stir fry them directly and they squirm about a bit, but then they die and I suck their heads, good juicy heads.

• Cajun Gay here: Pinch the shrimp tail to extract the meat within and discard the tail shell. If shrimp is fried tail-on, you can eat the tail shell.

• I love shrimp tails. Maximal crunch.

• Cajun gays suck well

• I was served a dish once in Hong Kong called drowning shrimp. It was a very hot, spicy soup into which live shrimp were dropped at the table. They squirmed as they cooked and then I was supposed to eat it. I ate it, but have never been able to eat shrimp since then.

• What is it with Asians and torturing their food?

• torture is our specialty

• Shrimp are high in cholesterol. You can easily suffer a coronary while eating them, tail or no tail. In Louisiana this is called making a fais do-do.

• How long until this thread devolves into a discussion of "shrimping"?

• You can go ahead and eat the tail if you are that stupid, it won't make you sick. But for most of us, we use the tail as a handle while we eat the shrimp, and pinch the tail to get the meat out of it instead of cutting it off with the meat still inside.

• If they don't expect you to eat the tail, why do they leave the tails one? Makes no sense.

• No they don't R16.

• I don't eat shellfish.

  Barbra%20Joan%20Streisand

• I think R9 should be fried.

• R13 Maybe they want you to eat the shrimp with your fingers holding the tail. As you would with a shrimp cocktail.

• OP unfortunately there ate many excellent sauced seafood dishes, like moules marinières, that are served with shells or tails intact. I'll admit I rarely order them as they tend to be messy. Also. I find it odd that the sauce or broth was cooked with the discards. Some restaurants will serve bouillabasse with the meat as a separate dish. It's silly. So many beef and poultry dishes are served with bones attached. It's just a personal thing. I don't mind shrimp served with the tails on, if the dish isn't sauced.

• I hope they were at least de-veined.

• R25 Especially if you know what "vein" is a euphemism for.

• You bite off the tails and spit them across the room.

  Miss Manners

• Chicken is served with bones. They don't expect you to eat the bones too R19.

• But why put it in meals that you eat like a stew or soap?

• R29, don't but the tail on the soap, put your soap on your tail.

• Finger food, dear, finger food.

• Ewww some places leave the heads on? Thats nasty!

• I eat them when the shrimp are fried.

• It is the height of gauchery not to eat the entire shrimp as it is presented. Cutting off the tail fin is an insult to your host. I suppose you do the same thing with lobster, don't you, OP? Tsk.

  Daryl%20Hannah