... roam the US with Bob and Michelle Hazlett in their Keystone Cougar High Country Fifth Wheel
Cajun Food Tours history and purpose is what defines us. Lafayette, Louisiana is the “Tastiest Town in the South,” and Cajun Food Tours wants you to experience it!Marie and her bus picked us up at the appointed time and place for our 'three-hour tour' (sounds like Gilligan's Island), where we would make five stops to enjoy Cajun cuisine.
My name is Marie and I am happy to call myself Cajun! I am especially proud of our uniquely incredible food! I can’t stand the thought of anyone coming to this city and not tasting our local favorites. Everyone who lives here does it; we either cook our own Cajun treats for our visitors or we drag them all over the five-parish area, making sure they experience what we get every day.
In November of 2010, I went on my first food tour in Baltimore, MD. After a couple more tours, I thought “Our food is so much better than this; someone really should do this in Lafayette!” Finally, I realized that someone was going to be me! So, I quit my job and bought a bus!
Boudin is various kinds of sausage in French, Luxembourg, Belgian, German, Quebec, Acadian, Creole, Surinamese Creole, Austrian and Cajun cuisine.
Boudin blanc: A white sausage made of pork without the blood. Pork liver and heart meat are typically included. In Cajun versions, the sausage is made from a pork rice dressing (much like dirty rice), which is stuffed into pork casings. Rice is always used in Cajun cuisine, whereas the French/Belgian version typically uses milk, and is therefore generally more delicate than the Cajun variety.
In French/Belgian cuisine, the sausage is sauteed or grilled. The Louisiana version is normally simmered or braised, although coating with oil and slow grilling for tailgating is becoming a popular option in Lafayette, New Orleans, Houston, Beaumont, and Baton Rouge.
Cracklings aka pork rinds, is the American name for fried or roasted skins of pigs, geese or other animals, regardless of the status or amount of pork in the snack. Pieces of fried meat, skin, or membrane produced as a byproduct of rendering lard are also called cracklings.
Cracklings consist of either roasted or fried pork rind that has had salt rubbed into it and scored with a sharp knife: "a crackling offers a square of skin that cracks when you bite into it, giving way to a little pocket of hot fat and a salty layer of pork meat."
Cajun cracklings (or "cracklins") from Cajun cuisine (called gratons in Louisiana French) are fried pieces of pork fat with a small amount of attached skin, flavored after frying with a mixture of peppery Cajun spices.
Pork rinds normally refer to a snack food commercially sold in plastic bags. They are made in a two-step process: pork skin is first rendered and dried, and then fried and puffed. These are also called by the Mexican name, chicharrón, in reference to the popular Mexican food.
A king cake (sometimes shown as kingcake, kings' cake, king's cake, or three kings cake) is a type of cake associated in a number of countries with the festival of Epiphany at the end of the Christmas season; in other places, it is associated with the pre-Lenten celebrations of Mardi Gras/Carnival.
What started out roughly 300 years ago as a dry French bread–type dough with sugar on top and a bean inside now comes in many varieties depending on the country. Some king cakes are made of a sweet brioche dough in the shape of a hollow circle with a glazed topping sprinkled with colored sugar. Hundreds of thousands of King Cakes are eaten in New Orleans during the Carnival season.
In other countries, king cakes are made with a puff pastry, filled with one of several fillings (e.g., almond, apple, chocolate/pear, etc.), and have a small figurine hidden inside. The figurine changes from bakery to bakery and often represents a hit movie or other cultural icon.
The cake often has a small plastic baby (to represent the Baby Jesus) inside or underneath; and the person who gets the piece of cake with the trinket has various privileges and obligations.Wikipedia
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"Lafayette is considered to be the center of Acadiana, the area of Cajun and Louisiana Creole culture in the state. It developed following the relocation of Acadians after their expulsion by the British from eastern Canada in the late 18th century following France's defeat in the Seven Years' War. There is also a strong Louisiana Creole influence in the area, as this mixed-race population became landowners and businesspeople."Wikipedia
Cajuns identify themselves as descendants of Acadian refugees.
Creole derives from the Spanish and Portuguese words criollo/criolo, which referred to someone born in the Americas during the colonial period. Creole is a term still used throughout Latin America and the Caribbean to describe local indigenous culture and people. In Louisiana, the term often describes the blending of French, African, Native American, and Spanish people and traditions, as well as those people of French or Spanish descent who are not Cajun. In southwest Louisiana, the term can refer more specifically to people of African descent who have French, Spanish, and/or Native American heritage.
Wikipedia says this about Creole: "In the United States, the word 'Creole' refers to people of any race or mixture thereof who are descended from colonial French La Louisiane and colonial Spanish Louisiana (New Spain) settlers before the Louisiana region became part of the United States in 1803 with the Louisiana Purchase. Both the word and the ethnic group derived from a similar usage, which began in the 16th Century, in the Caribbean that distinguished people born in the French, Spanish, and Portuguese colonies from the various new arrivals born in their respective, non-Caribbean homelands."
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| Adding Machines | Antique Cash Registers | Antique Spark Plugs |
| Antique Time Pieces | Automobiles | Batmobiles |
| Boats | Boat Motors | Brass Fans |
| Dolls | Fishing Lures | General Store Exhibit |
| Guns | Knives | Motorcycles |
| Native American Artifacts | Pedal Cars | Sports Memorabilia |
| Steinway Pianos | . . | . . |
