Month: October 2013

If ever there existed a map indicating the epicenter of deliciousness, that pinpoint would be riiiiiight here.  Best Stop, in Scott, Louisiana — which just happens to be the boudin capital of the world (seriously).

It’s a Disney World of Cajun wonderfulness.

Stuffed, smoked, marinated and deboned?  Well yeah.

Brisket, stuffed and seasoned.  Stuffed Quail.  Stuffed pork roast.  Stuffed pork chops.  Jalapenos stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped in bacon.  Stuffed mushrooms.  Deboned stuffed fryer with seasoned pork.  Stuffed duck breast.

Bring your styro cooler, or your Yeti.

No matter what, get the boudin.  Each day, they sell two thousand pounds of it.  On their website, they list the ingredients: ‘pork meat, a little pork liver, onions, bell peppers, red pepper, black pepper, salt, and msg. cooked in a big boiling pot for a long time… Once cooked it is ground then mixed with rice, green onions, and more red pepper, black pepper, salt, and msg. After is has all been mixed it is stuffed into a sausage like casing.’  And if, like me, you rebuff msg in principle, put it aside just for this one thing. Crazy delicious.

And the boudin balls.  Yes.

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The annual Boudin Cookoff in Lafayette was last weekend, and here are the winners.

Found this in Preston, Georgia

Earlier this year, we visited Pasaquan outside Buena Vista, Georgia (well, actually didn’t go inside since we were there on an ‘off’ day) but nevertheless got these pics.  The site is open every first Saturday, April – November, so if you’d like to go, next month is the time.  It’s on Eddie Martin Road.

The site was created by Eddie Owens Martin, 1908-1986 (Georgia, both) who started the environment here in 1957, walked around in robes (if anything) and had serious ‘big hair’, and went by the name ‘St. EOM’. After having sowed wild oats in NYC where among other things he made money as a fortune teller, he returned home to these four acres of land with the little house you can see in the picture below.

He established his own religion, Pasaquoyanism, cobbled together from other ideas but replete with symbolism of big hair, ultimately fashioned a faith to fill his own void. That void was never completely filled. He ultimately took his own life, and was sadly only widely recognized as an artist posthumously.

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The Canadian show Jason McCoy Eats America, visited Pasaquan this year:
https://www.facebook.com/video/embed?video_id=10202017417257194

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Art by St. EOM at the High — been in love with this since I first took this pic several years ago:

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Artists for Pasaquan will be November 2 and 3 this year:

BTW, what they’re calling ‘cosmic pickles’ above = koolickles!

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Kohler visited Pasaquan recently and discussed preservation.  From the Pasaquan site:
Terri Yoho, Executive Director, and Dan Smith, Senior Preservation Coordinator of the Kohler Foundation, spent two days touring Pasaquan and other art facilities located in the west Georgia region…

…Should the Kohler Foundation decide to undertake the restoration of Pasaquan, they would assume ownership of the art site, expend the funds, time, and expertise to restore the site, and then re-gift it to a recipient arts organization. That organization has not yet been selected. The recipient arts organization must agree to maintain the site into the future before any conservation work by Kohler could happen.

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This (as above) is how Kohler was able to help with sites like Kenny Hill’s sculpture garden in Chauvin, Louisiana — once the restoration was underway, the property was gifted to the nearby Nicholls State University.

We have a new favorite hotel in Houston, and…it doesn’t even cost serious money (it was under $100 that night before taxes,etc although I just looked and it’s much more than that right now, so perhaps we just got lucky).  We decided to stay at the Omni Westside this time because we wanted to be on the far side of Houston when leaving the next morning.

Before arriving, we joined their complimentary ‘Select Guest’ program so we could get free wifi in the room and some other things.  Checking in late in the evening, each of our boys got a carton of milk, a little backpack with games, etc, and there were drinks/snacks waiting for us in our room.  The next morning, there was a newspaper and free breakfast drinks that were delivered at the time we chose from the night before.  They were incredibly friendly.  The room was not amazing but certainly nice:

But one of the best aspects of the stay overall was the added entertainment — they have large koi ponds, and children are given packets of food to feed the fish:

This was a crazy amount of fun for the boys:

Feeding time.

What to call something that is pretty clearly the genus of pimento cheese but made without pimentos?  Roasted jalapeno not-pimento cheese is what I’m going with.  First of all, love jalapenos in any fashion.  Second of all, if you put in equal parts cream cheese to mayonnaise, you get this whole jalapeno popper thing.

And if you have ever been to a party where people serve armadillo eggs, imagine if you put cooked bacon/sausage in this.  *Then* what would you call it?  Armadillo cheese?  That really does not sound good but imagine it as a grilled cheese sandwich.  Yes.

So these are the jalapenos I started with…some green, some red…just about everything else here from the farmer’s market:

Slice them down the middle.  I halfway thought about going ahead and seeding them, but they are really so much easier to seed after roasting.

This is not so much a recipe as a ratio to keep in mind for your particular liking.  Grate enough cheese (I like monterey-jack) for whatever you’re doing — snacking, sandwiches, melting for dip — then add equal parts mayonnaise and cream cheese to get the smooth consistency you like, then as many jalapenos as you want for heat.  Salt, pepper, done.

Place in a bag the split jalapenos with a splash of olive oil and salt and pepper.  Shake, place onto a parchment paper-lined baking pan skin-side up, and roast at 400* for 15-20 minutes.  You’ll know they’re ready because they are looking somewhat deflated and the skin is wrinkling nicely:

Yessss:

Back of the spoon easily removes the skin, flip over and use the spoon to seed:

Still life with jalapeno:

This is what Cuisinart was made for: grate the cheese, switch blades, add mayonnaise and cream cheese, jalapenos, and blitz til done:

For those who only like a little heat, process until the peppers are small like this so it’s a little safer choice for a party:

If you’re like me and like big swaths of pepper, process that last bit very lightly and it’s perfect.

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Each Friday for an hour at 5:30p, the Atlanta Ritz-Carlton lobby bar, Lumen, brings in guest ‘pimentologists’ to prepare their signature pimento cheese for guests.