# Shrimp Tails **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 30, 2000, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619 "2000-03-30T15:05:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![koach](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ea666f/32.png) [@koach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koach)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2000, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/1 "2000-03-30T15:05:00Z")
Why do restaurants see fit to leave the tailes of shrimp on oin what would otherwise be a perfectly delightful meal?? ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2000, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/2 "2000-03-30T15:07:00Z")
Because they make good handles. ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2000, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/3 "2000-03-30T15:31:00Z")
They’re also nice and crunchy when fried! (pause for the gagging to subside) Just don’t do it when you have to impress anyone. ---
**Author:** ![Bluepony](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Bluepony](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bluepony)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2000, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/4 "2000-03-31T06:01:00Z")
…uh, so you can keep track of how many shrimp you ate? Stimulating conversation on a dinner date. He: Hey I ate seven shrimp and you ate nine, look at the tails! She: (thinking to herself) Loser… * * * _…send lawyers, guns, and money…_ ``` Warren Zevon ``` ---
**Author:** ![Zor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/848f3c/32.png) [@Zor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zor)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2000, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/5 "2000-03-30T19:10:00Z")
Aside from making a nice handle, I guess another reason would be to affirm the fact that you are actually eating a shrimp. Without the tail, it would just look like a piece of fried… erm… something… if they substituted that with some ingeniuos synthetic food, you’d never be able to tell the difference… ---
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2000, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/6 "2000-03-30T19:15:00Z")
In college, my roomate told me that where he came from they always ate the shrimp tales. Being gullible, I ate about ten–crunchy but not particularly tasty–before I noticed that on his plate there was a pile of very much uneaten shells. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2000, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/7 "2000-03-31T01:56:00Z")
Obviously, you swallowed his shrimp tale. BTW, the “vein” on a shrimp that’s removed before cooking isn’t a vein at all. It’s the intestine. Have a nice day. 🙂 * * * “What we have here is failure to communicate.” – Strother Martin, anticipating the Internet. [www.sff.net/people/rothman](http://www.sff.net/people/rothman) ---
**Author:** ![Sue\_Duhnym](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/91b2a8/32.png) [@Sue\_Duhnym](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sue_Duhnym)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2000, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/8 "2000-03-31T05:28:00Z")
> [@](#): > > BTW, the “vein” on a shrimp that’s removed before cooking isn’t a vein at all. It’s the intestine. Have a nice day. So deveining is really disembowling. ---
**Author:** ![Sycorax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a4c791/32.png) [@Sycorax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sycorax)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2000, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/9 "2000-04-01T00:13:00Z")
I suspect it has to do with aesthetics (don’t they look nicer with the tail?) plus they’d cost a whole lot more if somebody else took 'em off for you. I eat them if they’re crispy, and for some reason have this idea that they’re good for me. ---
**Author:** ![evilbeth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/evilbeth/32/2268_2.png) [@evilbeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilbeth)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/10 "2000-04-02T07:18:00Z")
So, anyone other than Sycorax and cornflakes regularly eat the tails in a restaurant? For those of you who do not, how do you remove the tails from your food when in a restaurant? Do you cut them off with a knife and then move them with your fork? Or do you remove the tail by hand to ensure you get all the yummy shrimp goodness and let people stare at you? I brought this question up at the NC Dopers’ meeting and no one really had an answer. They just looked at me weird. * * * I always try to do things in chronological order. ---
**Author:** ![SingleDad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9e8a1a/32.png) [@SingleDad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SingleDad)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/11 "2000-04-02T07:51:00Z")
I grab the tail, bite most of the shrimp off, then suck the last bit of shrimp from the piece of shell left near the tail… Mmmmmm good stuff, Maynard! ---
**Author:** ![ChiefScott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58f4c7/32.png) [@ChiefScott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChiefScott)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/12 "2000-04-02T08:10:00Z")
“Shrimp tails, shrimp tails, Roly-poly shrimp tails. Shrimp tails, shrimp tails, eat them up. Yum!” * * * Voted **Best Sport** And narrowly averted the despised moniker **Smiley Master** Forward deployed until 18AUG00 ---
**Author:** ![kaos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f17d59/32.png) [@kaos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaos)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/13 "2000-04-02T14:47:00Z")
personally, when i eat shrimp, i grab them by the tail, and then i semi-bite all the way through, and then pull away, getting all the shrimpy-goodness outta it. The reason why the tails are left on, is because it prevents them from rot. Yea, that’s right. There is a little peice of meat inside the tail, and if that peice of meat is exposed for a while, it begins to rot. Now, that peice of meat rts a lot quicker than the rest of the shrimp (not exactly sure why…) But yeah, that’s why when they are raw. I don;t really know why when they are cooked, perhaps less labour for the lazy ass cooks in this world? Trust me on that first part. I have worked in the Seafood department at my local grocery store for 5 years now… _wonders how he can stand it anymore…_ ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/14 "2000-04-02T15:35:00Z")
The shrimp tails are tasty when fried, with a little soy sauce and sesame seeds. Frinstance, at one of those cook-on-the-table Japanese restaurants, you can ask the guy to cook the shrimp tails for you. Just boiled, though, I dunno. I guess they wouldn’t hurt you, but I don’t know that they’d have much taste. ---
**Author:** ![Lucretia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/13edae/32.png) [@Lucretia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucretia)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/15 "2000-04-02T16:17:00Z")
I am a fan of shrimp tails myself. It’s probably partly upbringing, my whole family eats them. As a matter of fact, I knew a lot of people that ate the tails when I was growing up, and didn’t understand the strange looks I would get when I moved out to California and would eat them in resturants. Maybe it’s a New England thing? Possibly an Italian New England thing? Anyone else from that area of the country remember this? ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2000, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shrimp-tails/9619/16 "2000-04-02T18:36:00Z")
laziness is the first thing that comes to mind.