Hungry for Louisiana – Hungry for Louisiana

Hungry for Louisiana, Interviews with expats, Louisiana

What expats miss: Suz Redfearn says Jazz Fest & red beans

Proving the point that Louisiana expats pine for the food culture they left behind (a theme in the intro chapter of Hungry for Louisiana), I’m doing an interview series featuring transplants nationwide who still miss the food, drink and culinary rituals of the Bayou State. Here are thoughts from my friend Suz Redfearn, an accomplished freelance journalist who left Louisiana for Washington, D.C., in 1998. Comments from her appear in the book.

Cajun, Hungry for Louisiana, Local, Louisiana, The Writing Life

Hungry for Louisiana Chapter 1 Peers into Crawfish

This is one of my subjects, Rayne crawfish farmer Aaron Melancon, who was kind enough to let me tag along on his crawfish boat during my book research. You would not believe the work that goes into the painstaking act of crawfish farming. As I write in the book, the crawfish boil might be the epitome of abundance – outdoor tables piled high with steaming mudbugs – but when you see how few crawfish emerge from each trap (relatively speaking), you realize what goes into keeping the region’s rabid crawfish fans happy during the season.

Thank you Aaron for your hospitality!

Hungry for Louisiana, Louisiana, The Writing Life

Hungry for Louisiana the book has been released!

So excited! My book, Hungry for Louisiana, An Omnivore’s Journey (LSU Press) is out this month. You can find it on Amazon or in regional book stores, including large chains and local independents. It’s also in some gift shops and culinary stores, like Red Stick Spice Co. in Baton Rouge.

This was so much fun to work on. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it. The book includes an intro that explores how Louisiana’s food culture was local before local was cool and how there are few places in the world with such intact culinary traditions. Each subsequent chapter peers into a different food or ingredient from the state’s culinary tableau. Discover the quirks and traditions behind crawfish, jambalaya, Creole cream cheese, snoballs, filé, blood boudin, Zwolle tamales and oysters. Meet some of the people who produce these famed eats. This is breezy food writing with a few recipes at the end of each chapter.

Find out:

What Ashley Hansen of Hansen’s Sno-Bliz did when her grandfather’s famed snoball machine was on the fritz…

Why the northeast Louisiana town of Zwolle has a deep and meaningful tradition of tamale-making that is nothing like the Mississippi Delta’s…

Exactly what makes a pot of jambalaya achieve blue ribbon excellence at the annual Jambalaya Festival in Gonzales, Jambalaya Capital of the World…

And lots more.

Please keep coming back to this site for updates, additional material, photos and more recipes.

Thanks for your interest!

Newer Posts