A taste of Louisiana

Life in Louisiana is very unique and it's food is even more unique.  We are very passionate about our food.  We eat everything we can find and we spice it up like nowhere else.  Let me start with a few breakfast items.  Yes we eat coffee and beignets like advertised to the world.  Heavy on the coffee.  Most are familiar with "French toast" here we make it a little different and have two different names for it.  Some refer to it as Pan Pan Deaux, and others call it Lost Bread, but simply put it's stale bread coated in milk and egg wash then fried and sprinkled with sugar.  We love grits in the South.  Shrimp and grits is not uncommon but in my family we put Boudain in our grits.  What is Boudain you ask?  It is a sausage made from pork, rice, liver, green onions, and other spices.  In Louisiana, pork is a basic food group.  Boucheries don't happen as often as they did in the past but they still are a clinic in how we use the entire pig.  As the locals say, "we eat everything on the pig except the oink".  Most people would throw away a perfectly fine pig head.  In Louisiana we make Hog Head Cheese and pickled pig lips. Whoever made the commercial that says, "Pork, the other white meat" has never been to a boucherie.

Next we have our fruits and vegetables.  We love our onions and down here we refer to green onions as shallots.  I grow my own vegetables so I know a thing or two about tomatoes and in Louisiana, Creole tomatoes are things of idol worship.  My personal favorite is cucumbers.  We also brag on our own personal favorites when it comes to squash, beans, and peas.  One local favorite that is not for me is the mirliton.(pronounced "melly ton")  It's a "prickly pear" or a "vegetable pear".  But the vegetable that is a staple of Cajun cooking is okra.  Okra is something that can be cooked any which way and served at almost every meal.  It is also the base veggie for gumbo.  We also love our fruits, growing strawberries is an art form and picking wild blackberries is a rite of passage.  Figs are also included with those two and more jelly and jam you can eat is made every year. Also, if you grow fruit you must know how to make wine.  Whether it's strawberry, blackberry, or muscadine wine, everyone has a very passionate opinion about it.  As far as nuts go, there is only one you need to know about.  That's the pecan.  If you can't make pecan pie then you're not marrying material.  Most of our seasonings fall into the veggie category. Onions, bell peppers, parsley, celery, and basil are all chopped fine and considered seasoning.  And of course we love our cayenne pepper.  Whether it's in a jar pickled in vinegar, or a sauce, or dried season, a little red pepper makes everything better.


Everyone knows that Louisiana is a seafood lovers paradise.  Crawfish is one of our favorites.  While these mud bugs are plentiful, they are only available for about half the year.  Crawfish season usually starts in late January and ends in early June when they start to get to hard.  What can you make with crawfish?  There's crawfish etouffee, fried crawfish tails, crawfish bisque, crawfish jambalaya, crawfish stew, and oh yeah we like to boil them.  If you don't know how to boil crawfish, you'll never get a good woman to marry you.  We love shrimp as well.  There are two types of shrimp.  There is brown shrimp and white shrimp, and it would do you good to know the difference.  My wife's shrimp etouffee is the best.  Name a fish and we probably have it.  We have an abundance of freshwater and saltwater fish.  Two of my favorites are Red fish on the grill and the wife makes a mean fish court bouillon.  My all time favorite seafood is oysters.  While there are many ways to cook oysters, I prefer them raw.  In Louisiana they are good and salty.  They are so good you can pull one out of the cool water, crack it open and eat it on the spot.

Seems like I've only scratched the surface.  I haven't mentioned all the wildlife we eat.  Such as deer, squirrel, rabbit, alligator, quail, and ducks.  By the way nobody uses the word venison.  Most people that eat deer don't know it's called venison.  I've also failed to cover all the different types of dishes.  We have gumbo, jambalaya, etouffee, court bouillon, stews, deep frying, pan frying, barbecues, boiled seafood, baking, caking, preserves, and a few more that escape me at the moment.  Anyway, I hope that if you get to come to the bayou you don't waste a meal at a burger joint.  There's food everywhere and there's usually a good story told behind every meal.  Cooking is a part of our heritage and we not only enjoy it, we love to share it.  So in the words of my Dad, "come to la vey, and bring a little pig sha!".  That's truly C'est bon!