Country Roads Supper Club

For thirty-five years, Country Roads has helped the people of the River Road area from Natchez to New Orleans (and our Acadiana and Northshore neighbors!) explore the nature, culture, and cuisine of our beautiful and unique part of the world. This year, we’re excited to take this mission a step further with our first full season of Country Roads Supper Club events, bringing together the best local chefs, the most intriguing venues, and the most compelling cultural presentations to present three unforgettable evenings—think the versatility and novelty of a pop-up, elevated. (Great opportunities to wear seersucker.)

In March, we’ll head to Maison Madeleine, a historic bed and breakfast on the shores of Lake Martin, for our “Fly Away Home” dinner, where we’ll share a feast prepared by Cody and Samantha Carroll, past winners of a Country Roads Small Town Chefs award and stars of the new Food Network show Cajun Aces. Before the dinner, guides from Audubon Louisiana will lead guests on tours of the splendid natural rookery nearby, where you can expect to see herons, egrets, cormorants, and the Roseate Spoonbill (billed as the "Cajun flamingo”) preparing their nests for spring.

Then in April’s “Dinner on the Docks,” we're visiting Baton Rouge's new Water Campus, a new riverfront center for cutting-edge research in science, engineering, and other specialties related to the complex relationships among water, land, and people, both in Louisiana and around the world. Mississippi native Jeffrey Hansell, the chef at Covington's Oxlot 9, renowned for his fresh ingredients and scrumptious takes on fresh Gulf seafood, will present a sustainable seafood menu that argues you can have your fish and eat it, too. (He’s also a past Small Town Chefs winner—can we pick ‘em or what?)

And in May, join us at Laura Plantation for “Tell Us a Story,” an evening looking at the complex interplay of Creole cultures in Louisiana’s river road region. Vacherie’s Laura Plantation, where West African folk tales about animals developed into the well-known Br’er Rabbit stories, has conscientiously grappled with slavery's legacy as it has continued its mission as a site commemorating the Creole experience in Louisiana, both black and white. Senegalese chef Serigne Mbaye’s will showcase the continuity between West African and Creole cuisines.

If you can’t join us this spring, come to our annual Small Town Chefs Awards dinner this summer—now a Country Roads Supper Club event, this one-of-a-kind dinner celebrates the best chefs in our area working in towns with populations under 25,000. And stay tuned for the announcement of our fall series, which will boast three more curated events bringing the most exciting chefs in Louisiana to fresh, unusual venues for memorable dining experiences. Come join us for supper!

Learn about upcoming Supper Club events at countryroadsmagazine.com/cuisine/supper-club.