Catfish fillets rubbed with a blackening seasoning and cooked in the air fryer!

Air Fryer Blackened Catfish

If you love well seasoned fish, you're gonna love this blackened catfish and it's made a little easier with the air fryer!

Usually when I blacken anything, it requires a screaming hot cast iron pan and that creates an intense amount of smoke, so for me, it's relegated to cooking outside on the grill. It works great, but the heat has really kept me from being able to do outdoor cooking in the summer.

This method provides a beautiful and flavorful blackening and it's done right in the air fryer on the kitchen counter and minus the smoke.

Pasta salad, made with tiny shell pasta, tossed with a dressing made with mayonnaise, sour cream and Creole mustard with grilled salmon folded in.

Grilled Salmon Pasta Salad

I love fish! Some of my favorites include Mississippi farm raised catfish, of course, as well as the bounty from our beloved Mississippi Sound and Gulf of Mexico. 

White trout, speckled trout, redfish, mackerel, snapper, red drum, grouper, even good ole ground mullet and Biloxi Bacon aka striped popeye mullet or jumping mullet, are just some of the fish that are found here, and frankly most of us from here were just about weaned on it all from birth!

Social Media Roundup Seafood Favorites 2

Social Media Roundup - Seafood Favorites 2, What You Missed! Gulf Coast Style Pan Fried Crab Cakes, Hushpuppy Breaded Fried Shrimp, Godchaux Mixed Seafood Salad with Creole Vinaigrette Dressing, Seafood and Eggplant Dressing and Spicy Orange Pecan Shrimp Stir Fry

Seafood Favorites 2

We've been sharing more of our classic favorites on social media lately and of course, considering I live right along the Gulf Coast that is very often seafood and certainly a lot of shrimp recipes!

I do love shrimp and it's a very versatile protein.

Of course Fridays have always been a seafood day here where I live, as much as Mondays have always been a red beans and rice day, but we have amazing seafood here along the Gulf Coast so any day can be a seafood day!

Social Media Roundup Seafood Favorites 1

Social Media Roundup - Seafood Favorites, What You Missed! Skillet Shrimp and Pasta with Asparagus, Classic Fried Shrimp on a Po'boy, Crabbie Melts, Tex-Mex Grilled Shrimp Tacos and Boudin Stuffed Shrimp.

Seafood Favorites 1

My husband, aka to y'all as The Cajun, loves his seafood.

Anytime I fix supper that is seafood based he talks about how blessed we are here along the Gulf Coast to have such great access to fresh seafood, and he's right!

The best deal of course is when you get out there on a boat and catch it fresh yourself. You can even pull in some good eating right off of a local pier, but buying it at the local fish monger is good too, though you do pay a bit of a premium because somebody else did the work!

But... what if you're landlocked?

An easy skillet meal, made with shrimp, sautéed peppers and onion, tossed with small shell pasta and finished with a cheesy cream sauce.

Seagrove Shrimp with Pasta and Peppers

I ran across a recipe for this Seagrove Shrimp in the cookbook Best of the Best from the Deep South (#ad), a compilation of regional recipes drawn from various cookbooks from Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. These are the same folks who published my cookbook actually! (#ad)

I don't know how the name Seagrove Shrimp came about, but if I was to venture a guess, I'd say it probably was named after a dish at a local restaurant in the Seagrove Beach, Florida area, or perhaps even invented in a beach condo by someone vacationing there.

I sure do love my Gulf Coast y'all and these beach communities along the Florida coast are my favorite get aways!

The flavors of a shrimp gumbo with smoked sausage, in a light roux with the trinity of vegetables and okra, tossed with a short cut pasta.

Shrimp Gumbo Pasta

Gotta love a one pot pasta meal that doesn't include having to precook the pasta!

That's the case with this meal, a one pot meal that is somewhat in line with the Pastalaya recipe I've shared before. That recipe has the classic flavors of a chicken and sausage jambalaya, in a quick and easy skillet pasta dinner.

Fresh Gulf shrimp, marinated in milk, egg and hot sauce, then tossed in a well-seasoned hushpuppy dredge and deep fried to perfection.

Hushpuppy Breaded Fried Shrimp

Some years back, Popeye's Louisiana Kitchen, which by the way makes the most delicious fried chicken evah, introduced seafood to the menu in some areas. Some menu items were offered only on a limited time basis. Hushpuppy Fried Shrimp was one of those.

I was intrigued.

So, for research purposes, I requested that my husband aka here as "The Cajun" swing in and pick up a small order of them on his way home for us to try.

A quick skillet meal of shrimp and smoked sausage with wide egg noodles in a creamy sauce.

Creamy Cajun Shrimp and Sausage with Noodles

We are so blessed with fresh seafood and Gulf shrimp is available year round, very often fresh off the boat which is my preferred method of purchase. 

I'm always fooling around with different shrimp and pasta combinations to try different things and this is one of those instances. As a recipe writer and owner of a food-related website, there's a lot of experimenting and often it takes multiple tries to get a recipe just right.

At least that's my philosophy as a food blogger, because one thing I can guarantee and that is when a recipe appears on my website, it has been well-tested to meet my approval.

A creamy tomato-based stew with shrimp, crawfish and crab and served over hot, steamed rice.

Seafood Pan Roast

Several years back, I was looking through a Martha Foose cookbook, Screen Doors and Sweet Tea, that contained a recipe for what was called a seafood pan roast. Since The Cajun and I don't eat out much, this was an unfamiliar dish for me.

At the time, I couldn't find much about it around the internet either and even today there still isn't much out there. I went ahead and made it, but with no photos to let me know if I was anywhere on track let's just say mine didn't turn out quite right. With the cost of seafood, I abandoned it to experiment a bit more thoroughly another time.

A shrimp gumbo, made with a roux and the trinity, and the addition of boiled eggs to stretch the meal and add additional protein for the Lenten season. Eggs may be omitted if you prefer.

Lenten Shrimp and Egg Gumbo

Egg most often appears throughout the year in a gumbo made from a hen or chicken, quail eggs in everything else often, though during Lent it's seafood. The egg stretches the meal and adds extra protein.

I based my version on a recipe from Best of the Best from Louisiana cookbook, which did not include okra, so I left it out, though certainly use some if you prefer. Some folks will argue with you that it's not a gumbo without it because they probably read that somewhere.

Nicely seasoned whole catfish fillets, pan seared, then smothered in an etouffée gravy and served over rice, noodles, mashed potatoes or grits.

Smothered Catfish Etouffée

Can you take another etouffée? Oh my goodness, yes. We do "smother" a lot of different foods down south!

• The most commonly known smothered dish is probably, Crawfish Etouffée. Even folks visiting our area are probably most familiar with this dish. Delish and great served with a nice blackened catfish too.
• Lesser known but popular locally is this shortcut Shrimp Etouffee, and let's just say I was very surprised when a friend from Louisiana shared this little shortcut secret!

Of course, seafood isn't the only thing we smother!

A New Orleans restaurant favorite, seasoned oysters and bacon are threaded on skewers, passed in a buttermilk egg wash and dredged in flour and fried. Serve with a lemon butter sauce, toast points and lemon wedges.

Oysters en Brochette

It is thought that this dish originated at Galatoire’s restaurant in New Orleans, initially believed to have come from a Réveillon Christmas Eve dinner menu, though don't quote me on that! It may just be that Galatoire's is the only restaurant left that still serves it. Does make sense though as it's a bit fancy looking, isn't it? 

Wild American shrimp are butterflied, highly seasoned, dipped in flour, then blended milk and egg and last in panko breadcrumbs, then deep-fried.

Deep-Fried Butterflied Panko Shrimp

Even though I love fried shrimp all kinds of ways, my number one way to make them is the classic version.

It's the one I crave and make the most.

I also love them batter-dipped or tempura style and if I'm baking them like an oven fry, panko breadcrumbs are likely to be my top choice of breading, just for the added crunch.

This time I thought I'd try the panko breadcrumbs in a deep fry instead, and I'm glad I did. They turned out fantastic!

Seasoned shrimp quickly air fried and finished in a toss of a garlic butter blend. Use as a snack shrimp, great when served in individual appetizer cups for a party pass around or toss with cooked pasta for a main dish meal.

Air Fryer Garlic Shrimp

I love my air fryer! I may have mentioned that before??

It's great for reheating certain leftovers to bring back the crisp - like fried chicken - and it does an amazing job of reheating pizza. A lot of busy moms use them to cook freezer foods - like chicken nuggets and tenders, French fries and tater tots, corn dogs, egg rolls, and, in fact, many products have begun putting air fryer instructions on their packaging.

But I love it for cooking too!

Fish fillets, tossed in a mix of yellow and Creole mustard with hot sauce, dredged in a highly seasoned blend of cornmeal and flour, then deep fried.

Mustard Fried Fish

In case you didn't know, we're pretty big on fresh fish here along the Gulf Coast!

Local Gulf favorites include speckled trout (my personal favorite), flounder, snapper, grouper, redfish, drum and lots of others in the deeper waters. Give me any one of them!

The Cajun goes fishing with his brother on occasion and the fish they come home with most often are two very popular fish found in the Mississippi Sound - white trout and ground mullet - also known more officially as southern kingfish.

Salmon, simply seasoned and pan-seared in a hot cast iron skillet, then transferred to the oven to finish, producing a perfectly cooked, juicy, tender and flaky fillet.

Cast Iron Seared Salmon

I grew up, and still live on the Central Gulf Coast where seafood is abundant. Whether you catch your own, or pick it up from a local seafood market, there's nothing that can compare to it from a grocery store freezer section, nevermind that which comes from foreign markets. Nothing.

Minced cooked crawfish combined with egg, crushed saltines, seasonings and fresh parsley, shaped into patties and pan fried or air fried for a Deep South favorite.

Crawfish Burger Patties

Most everybody is familiar with seafood cakes in the form of crab cakes and tuna or salmon patties. All are well-loved and popular, especially here along the coast during Lent, but you may not have thought about crawfish!

I know that around the country as a whole, crawfish are, well... let's say a little weird and misunderstood, but here along the Gulf Coast and especially in Louisiana and Mississippi, crawfish season is anticipated every year like a kid at Christmas.

Yep. Crawfish boils are a thing, and a pretty big thing here along the coast.

A baked rice dressing, made with freshly shucked Gulf oysters, with sautéed onion, green onion, bell pepper, celery, garlic, rice and seasonings, and always a holiday favorite here in the Deep South.

Oyster Rice Dressing

Rice stands in for bread and cornbread in this common dish here in the Deep South and is what we refer to as a rice dressing.

A mix of meats or seafood, or sometimes, as with this oyster rice dressing, a blend of them, along with onion, green onion, bell pepper and celery, rice and seasonings, it's very often offered as a side dish, though it is also used as a stuffing at times.

One thing is for sure. It's a favorite here in the Deep South year-round, and super popular for  Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner.

Wild-caught American shrimp, preferably Gulf shrimp, nicely seasoned and sautéed in butter with fresh basil and mushrooms, tossed in a sour cream sauce and served with parsley rice.

Shrimp Victoria

This is another one of those easy, yet superb, New Orleans restaurant shrimp dishes, once popular at both Brennan's restaurant and Commander's Palace. It became a classic New Orleans favorite and was, at one time, served in many homes here in the Deep South.

Once again, however, nobody seems to know how the name came to be!

A classic and simple Deep South version of fish stew, made with farm-raised, Mississippi catfish, and gently stewed in a trinity-enhanced, Creole tomato sauce with potatoes.

Catfish Stew

Unlike Cajun Coubion (aka Courtbouillon), in which the creole stew is prepared through and the fish, most often redfish or snapper, is laid out on top of the stew to poach near the end of cooking, this is prepared with the catfish stirred into the gently simmering stew, and allowed to lightly break down.