Breaux Karl - Cooking in Cajun Country

Travel through South Louisiana and youll quickly learn that Cajun cooking is more than a heavy dose of black pepper, a splash of tangy hot sauce, or a fancy name to a fast food creation. In fact, much of what the country enjoys as Cajun might be as foreign to Louisiana as a snowstorm. Not to mention its much more delicious.

Cajun cuisine has evolved drastically since the Acadians left the west coast of France for Canada, changing as its people were exiled and relocated to Louisiana, then altered even more when they came in contact with the colonys Spanish, German, Italian, and other nationalities and adopting to the deltas agriculture and livestock. Even in the Cajun heartland of Louisiana, an area that stretches from Mississippi to Texas and incorporates twenty-two parishes (counties), the cuisine differs from region to region.

Cajun Karl Breaux, whose family hails back more than two hundred years in South Louisiana, will quickly tell you that nothing goes to waste in a Cajun household, how living off the land was integral to the culture, and how even a day trip out to the camp or houseboat can revive an urban soul. And that from the Mississippi state line to the Sabine River fronting Texas, from the Gulf of Mexico to dead center of the state, Cajuns cook up delectable food in a wide variety of ways.

In this cookbook, Breaux explains the nuances of oyster harvesting in the southeast bayous and the communal tradition of la boucherie, or hog butchering, in the upper prairies. He shows how some areas prefer their gumbos light with seafood while others choose a darker roux with wild game and sausage. Alligator sauce piquante is a favorite along the bayous and marshes while rice dishes dominate the southwest, where crawfish and rice are grown in alternating seasons. Crawfish, although consumed statewide, takes on an almost religious significance in Lafayette and surrounding areas, which is why the town of Breaux Bridge is considered the Crawfish Capital of the World.

Go hunting and fishing with Breaux, wholl share stories as old as the people, and youll learn why certain foods are so culturally vital to authentic Cajun cooking. Then try them out for yourself.

We hope you enjoy these recipes at home, but please, come visit. The next best thing to reading about Cajun Country and cooking up a gumbo on a chilly fall evening is sampling this unique American cuisine first hand. Well leave a space at the table.

Before the founding of Jamestown, a group of French pioneers crossed the Atlantic Ocean to settle in what is now the Maritimes region of Canada. Most of their settlements were in Nova Scotia, but some ventured into Prince Edward Island and upper New Brunswick. Because of the massive tides in the Bay of Fundy, these French settlers established fertile farmland by creating an elaborate system of dykes that held back the sea. They called their land Acadie, or Acadia.

Over the years these Acadians developed a colonial way of life that defined them in language, music, farming, and cuisine. They lived peacefully with the neighboring Indians and rarely participated in the wars between England and France, which had spread into the New World.

Acadie passed back and forth from France to England until the British fully conquered the area in the eighteenth century. The English allowed the Acadians to remain on their land but made demands on their language and Catholic religion, which the Acadians either ignored or attempted to alter through negotiations. Despite being peaceful citizens, the Acadians lived and farmed the richest land in the region and outnumbered the English and were thus viewed as a threat.