Lake Martin Lagniappe

Since when should dinner stop at four courses? We've got a wealth of entertainment planned for our March 25 Supper Club, at Maison Madeleine on Lake Martin, prepared by Chefs Cody and Samantha Carroll of Sac-a-Lait in New Orleans and Hot Tails in New Roads. Read on for the full details of our programming. The spring Supper Club series is presented by Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism.

Taste

Chefs Cody and Samantha Carroll have created a menu truly worthy of the title Cajun Aces. Passed appetizers will include Shrimp and Mirliton Stuffed Frog Legs and Crawfish Tourtières, a kind of savory pie with a long Acadian tradition. After guests are seated, they’ll begin with Hot Quail with Toasted Millet, made “hot” through the application of a special long-fermented hot sauce made in-house by the Carrolls. This will be followed by a more exotic treat: Duck Hearts with Goat Cheese Grits and Pickled Turnips, a chance to enjoy the Carrolls’ bold, experimental flair. Next up, savor a Pheasant Ponce, a classic Cajun sausage style, which will arrive with the delicious accompaniment of Horseradish Whipped Potatoes and Cane Vinegar Collards. The meal concludes with Nest à la Bouille, an avian spin on the beloved Louisiana Tarte à la Bouille.  

Listen

Get ready for the best in Cajun music with a performance by Joel Savoy and Friends. A ten-time Grammy nominee and the winner of one with band Courtbouillon, Savoy is the son of famed Cajun music stars Marc and Ann Savoy. He’s appeared on the big screen in The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood and All the King’s Men,  and on the small screen in HBO’s Tremé and Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations­—but he’s most often seen with his brother Wilson and their parents in the Savoy Family Cajun Band or with the legendary Cajun powerhouse Jesse Lége. A highly visible figure who has been at the forefront of the Louisiana music revival of the last twenty years, Savoy was recently named the new Artistic Director of the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes in Port Townsend, Washington. Get ready to tap some toes! 

Learn

Audubon Louisiana biologists will be present for the event, leading a boating outing and bird walk (weather permitting, as always in this part of the world) and answering questions about the birds who live at and pass through Lake Martin. One of Audubon’s current projects in the area focuses on the prothonotary warbler, a charismatic, bright yellow little bird that nests in nooks and crannies, unlike its relatives, and has a distinct tweeting call. Audubon scientists have tagged warblers in Lake Martin with tracking devices, in order to better understand their migratory patterns and the dangers they face during their yearly trek to and from wintering grounds in Central and South America. Protecting this bird means understanding its entire life cycle, and work at Lake Martin is central to that research.

Look

Baton Rouge artist Chase Mullen will be on hand to provide a painting demonstration. Mullen’s Audubon-inspired works document the Louisiana landscape and its wildlife, combining intense attention to detail with a playfulness that lets him incorporate contemporary elements like road signage, license plates, and other whimsical juxtapositions (raccoon riding deer; crawfish perched on gator skull) that express the fact that, in Louisiana, the space between the manmade and the teeming natural world out of which it is carved is never very great. “I mean, where else would you see alligator roadkill? Here, so many towns and cities seem to be teetering on the edge of the swamp; you just can’t separate the natural and human worlds.” Follow his work at chasemullenstudios.com or on Instagram @chasemullenstudios. 

Tickets to our March 25 Supper Club are going fast, but can be found at BonTempsTix.com, alongside our April and May Supper Clubs.

This article originally appeared in our March 2018 issue. Subscribe to our print magazine today.