Despite English and Australian roots, publisher James Fox-Smith happily dives into the Great Etouffée Debate.
The Good
by James Fox-Smith
“So what’s Cajun food?” Sixteen years ago and setting foot in Louisiana for the first time, that is the question it occurred to me to ask when taken to a Baton Rouge-area restaurant that we’ll identify in a minute. My future wife answered that question by ordering me a huge platter of crawfish etouffée. It might be a slight oversimplification to say that our love was forged over that platter of lusciously rich, buttery, seafood stew, but suffice it to say that I’ve had a soft spot for, and strongly held opinions about, the stuff ever since.
So when we hit upon the idea of a column that went in search of exceptional etouffée, it was a given that I’d be returning to the site of my initial conversion. I was assigned the Baton Rouge area, and after spending a couple of weeks on an all-etouffée diet, I’m pleased to report that, all biases aside, my favorite etouffée is (still) the one served at The Chimes.
Admittedly, in light of the highly subjective mission we had set ourselves, cries of bias are inevitable here, but The Chimes’ etouffée gets my vote for these reasons:
• 1: It’s luxuriously thick and glossy without succumbing to gelatinousness.
• 2: There are plenty of identifiable vegetables—bell peppers, onions, celery—and the piles of crawfish are plump and juicy but never overcooked.
• 3: It’s a rich, tomatoey, reddish orange hue, surmounting a generous serving of well-cooked rice and garnished with obviously fresh-chopped parsley.
• 4: And it’s not so heavily spiced as to obscure the lovely flavor marriage of Cajun trinity, tomato acidity, rich crawfish stock, and all that butter, too.
Call me biased, but The Chimes’ etouffée set my culinary compass where Cajun food is concerned. And sixteen years on, it still does.
Details. Details. Details.
The Chimes
3357 Highland Road
Baton Rouge. La.
(225) 383-1754
The Bad
by Dale Irvin
I am once again the victim of my own eternal optimism. When one has really high hopes, there’s such a long way to fall.And so it was when I spotted a sign at a truck stop on Highway 190 in Hammond just beyond the off-ramp for Interstate 55.Along with the expected familiar fried offerings awaiting under the heat lamps inside, was the promise of crawfish etouffée!Let’s start with the good news. First, the fact that you can buy something so far beyond a beef jerky stick at a gas station is a testament to our local food culture right from the get go. And then there was the friendly young woman, who carefully wiped the bit of spilled etouffée from the rim of the Styrofoam cup into which it had just been ladled, much as the staff at a fine restaurant might do the final touch up on an upscale entree just plated, before sending it out into the dining room.But alas, despite how the dark roux in the dish made a nice color contrast with the electric blue counters in the trucker’s dining area, it was that same dark roux that first signaled the disappointment ahead. For me etouffée must be golden. This was brown, and tasted most notably of the caramelized flour that is a roux. I searched in vain for flecks of the Holy Trinity, garlic, peppers, or onion. And most egregiously absent of all was any hint of the butter that is at the heart of a good etouffée sauce.And as verification of the admission just offered by my young lady at the counter that the étouffeé was made “somewhere else, I don’t know where” and shipped in to be reheated, the crawfish were rubbery. Although they weren’t mealy, the worse case scenario, and they didn’t have that nasty iodine taste that emerges when the crustaceans have been kept about a tad too long.Okay, I know, I’ve demanded a lot from a truck stop deli counter. So back to my original positive note, here I was having etouffée for the astoundingly low price of $2.49 at a gas station overlooking the big rigs fuelling up outside, something you just won’t experience anywhere else in the world.
Details. Details. Details.
I’m withholding the exact location here to protect the innocent—that nice young lady behind the deli counter.
And the Serendipitous
by Anne Craven
There’s no Cajun blood running through these veins, but I do feel somewhat qualified to chime in on the quest for outstanding etouffée. Why? Because I live to daydream about, talk about, and inhale food. This is how the editorial department’s discussion went: “Anne, how would you like to drive around and taste–” “Yes.”
And who are you going to believe? James the Australian, Dale the Midwesterner, or me– the one born and bred in south Louisiana? I figured the best crawfish etouffée would probably be off the beaten track, so with a disturbing amount of enthusiasm did I drive over to the Atchafalaya environs accompanied by my equally excited mom, from whom I inherited a love of day trips.
We were in Breaux Bridge when mom returned to the car from a local opinion finding mission and told me we had to drive over to Poché’s. I thought, “Isn’t that a meat market?” When she told me en route that the lady who had recommended Poché’s was also an employee there, I came this close to slamming on the brakes and refusing to proceed. But good fortune forced our car forward, because the crawfish etouffée at Poché’s is superlative.
The color was a study in orange-brown perfection, and the etouffée seeped down into the rice instead of sitting on top like a hat. There were generously-sized chunks of onion, bell pepper, and celery which made me feel like I ate at least one USDA daily vegetable serving. The salt factor was just right, and so supreme was the sauce that the delectable, sauce-soaked crawfish didn’t emit even a hint of fishiness. Spicy? Quite. Possibly a bit too much for me and mom, but if it was too spicy for us then it would be just right for ninety-nine percent of the Louisiana population.
As a former teacher, I just can’t help myself; Poché’s crawfish etouffée gets an A+. And I can’t wait to go back and sample the smothered rabbit! Stay tuned.
Details. Details. Details.
Poché’s Market and Restaurant
3015 Main Highway
Breaux Bridge, La.
(337) 332-2108
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