If you're looking for a real Cajun food experience, you can find
it at LeBleu's Landing in Sulphur, Louisiana.
The restaurant is named for the earliest settler of this
southwest corner of Acadiana, Bartheleme Blaise LeBleu. The
family history includes a lot of Jean Lafitte lore. Obviously
Lafitte loved good food.
I
can be sure of that since he was French. Have you ever known a
Frenchman who didn't love good food?
Shelley and Kevin
Downs,
LeBleu's Landing
owners, are
carrying on the tradition in a big way. They have a friendly
family oriented place where you can dine on good Cajun food
either as entrees or from their plentiful buffet. They also have
something unusual. When you enter the shop side of the building,
you are facing a huge window. If you arrive at the right time,
you can see another Cajun tradition being performed before your
eyes.
Cajuns are known for many types of food, mostly seafood but the
most traditional food is boudin. Originally this spicy Cajun
sausage was made by families when they butchered their hog.
Here, you can see it made from scratch then buy your own to take
home or eat
it there.
This was what we went to see primarily. Matthew Fruge
met us and explained how he was going to make the boudin. He
told he that he had been making boudin at home since he was a
youngster. Some things have changed over the years. They no
longer use the organs or the blood. Instead he uses pork chops.
We
were able to watch the entire process through that big glass
window. He explained that the entire process takes about an hour
and a half to two hours if you count the cooking time. He makes
boudin every second day so check before your visit.
He had already boiled the pork and rice and proceeded to feed
the steaming hot pork mixed with the rice, onions and spices
thought the grinder. As he ground he added a bit of the broth he
had used to cook the pork.
Here he used a big commercial grinder but he told us that at
home they used a smaller one. Then he carefully scraped it all
into a large stainless steel container.
Next step involved stuffing it into the casing.
He
dumped the mixture into a black iron cylindrical container that
was used to pump it out into the casing which he then
carefully
fed it onto a pipe-like fitting that he called a "horn" on the
black container.
Presto! Within minutes, the meat and rice mixture was filling
the casings and Matthew was twisting it off to appropriate
length of sausage.
It was a spicy delicious treat. For those who do not like it
quite as spicy, he makes a milder version as well.
Just
watching it made is part of the magic of boudin.
For more info:
http://www.lebleuslanding.com
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