Cajun vs. Creole
LafayetteTravel.com has a wonderful article on Cajun vs. Creole. The article mostly focuses on food but talks a bit about the differences in culture too, clearing up a lot of the misconceptions about our distinct culture and food. The whole article is wonderful but this is my favorite part, as it rings so true:
But for day-in, day-out eating, there is nothing more popular than rice and gravy. In fact, a true Cajun can look at a field of growing rice and tell how gravy it will take to cover it when all the rice is cooked. Whole generations of people have lived and died in south Louisiana and never known that some people in other places serve a meal that does not include rice and gravy. Here, the concept never enters the mind.
When I first moved to California, I had no idea that people didn’t have rice and gravy for supper at least once a week, much less ever! To this day, when I say “gravy,” people think of the flour-based white gravy and cringe. I would too if I thought that’s what gravy was! The Cajun vs Creole article has this to say about the gravy “First of all, it is brown. With all due deference to Texans, Cajuns use that white stuff they put on top of chicken fried steaks to hang wallpaper. Gravy is brown, not white. That’s it.” I couldn’t find a picture of rice and gravy on our photo album but I did find a picture of the gravy before I gets poured onto the rice.
That’s my mom’s Stuffed Round Steak gravy. Talk about good!
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Chrissy, as usual you find some good stuff. I had to add my own two cents and cover it on my blog.
Thanks
MC
LOL about rice and gravy. Just a week ago, I was craving some of my mom’s rice and gravy really badly! So I called her up to tell me how to make it (since I’d never tried before). And I love mine with some sweet peas and some A1 on the side for my meat. I was in heaven after I ate it, and it must have been ok because my husband scarfed it up! Ah…good ol’ rice and gravy.
Most Californians have never had dirty rice either. Great Blog. I found it through Mostly Cajun. My Uncle was the Principal of Carencro High for a few years and my Mom comes from Lake Charles. I love Southwest Louisiana and can’t wait to get back.
I was born in Plaucheville but now living in Metairie. My father,Rubie Jeansonne, was the Principal in Plaucheville in about the 40’s. Now it time to go back the P-ville and visit.
Gibbons Jeansonne