To the Cajun Meat Markets We Go

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I returned to LaPlace, LA today with Southern Mom and our chirren to buy us some meat. Not just any meat, mind you. Top quality andouille. And boudin. And hog’s head cheese.

Here’s the deal. We Louisianans are persnickety about our food. And it is not uncommon to drive for an hour for one ingredient for a dish. Frankly, it could be tantamount to blasphemy not to do so for some ingredients. Andouille is one such ingredient. Andouille is, simply, a cajun sausage; a slow-smoked pork sausage. There is one place across the river  that has respectable andouille. And that is already a 30 minute drive. Tack on another 15 minutes, and you find yourself in the Andouille Capital of the World (or so proclaimed former Governor Edwards).

There are two places in LaPlace that are famous (yes, famous–one is advertised as being used by top chef John Besh and the other was recently showcased on “Feasting on Asphalt with Alton Brown”) for selling their cajun meats. And oddly, they are within feet of each other.

We loaded up the ice chest and hit the, er, asphalt. We went first to Jacob’s.


Knowing I’d be going here today, I mentioned it to a few friends and family members. They all asked for some goodies. So I was buying for five. You walk in Jacob’s and are first surprised at how small it is in there. But you quickly overcome that with the delicious smoky smell of their fare. It is wonderful. I got three links of andouille and four servings of hog’s head cheese. Then I saw hot tamales and thought of CS and grabbed a bag of them, too. Here’s all of what you can order:

Southern Mom picked up some boudin. Wonder if she’ll offer any to her Beagle (aptly named Boudin).

Then we skipped over to Bailey’s.

The smoky smell wasn’t as strong (but that may be because I had gotten used to it at Jacob’s or because Bailey’s is substantially larger inside than Jacob’s). Here, I picked up four more links of andouille and one more hog’s head cheese. Here’s Bailey’s mascot, Sausage Man:

We overlooked that he reminded us a tad of South Park’s Mr. Hanky, the Christmas Poo (judge for yourself):

And by the end of the day, I had spent just around $50. And for that, I got all this:

and had a great time to boot! I sense gumbo in my near future. Stay tuned for a review of which andouille is better.

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