pdfs nav new orleans pdf

The journey of French rémoulade sauce, a classic mustardy mayonnaise with herbs, capers, and gherkins, across the Atlantic Ocean to Acadia (now eastern Quebec), the Maritime provinces, parts of New England, and eventually on to the American South is a culinary story worth telling. In the early 1600s, the first French arrived in Acadia and took up a life of farming crops and raising livestock. A century and a half later, many descendants of those early Acadians were forced from their northern homes by the British, eventually winding up in South Carolina, Georgia, and Louisiana. Those who settled in Louisiana soon came to be called Cajuns, as did their language, a lilting patois unique to the area but universally understood in their joyous music. And rémoulade? Unfortunately, there is no accessible literature that describes how the sauce was interpreted on Acadian tables. However, as it wended its way to Louisiana, via the American Northeast and the French Indies, it underwent a gastronomic evolution, becoming more spirited with additions of minced bell pepper and celery, tomato paste, sometimes Worcestershire sauce, horseradish, and especially Louisiana’s own feisty Tabasco sauce. Here is my interpretation of that well-traveled sauce, now a Cajun rémoulade, served on a New Orleans plate with crab cakes and Creole sausage.