Twain's Feast - Andrew Beahrs [97]
As the river changed, so did the life along it; and changes along the river changed the food of the South. Though Twain’s menu included Southern-style light bread, wheat bread, and egg bread, in his youth none of these were as common as his corn bread, corn pone, and hoecake. But as the plow moved west into the mixed prairies of Kansas and Nebraska, wheat had ceased to be a luxury in the South. The opening of the Midwest’s great flour mills meant that biscuits made with white flour would be far more common on Southern tables in the twentieth century than in Twain’s childhood; his offhand comment that many steamboat pilots had left the river “to grind at the mill” had some truth in it.
But the biggest change in New Orleans cooking was emancipation. Though some remained as employees, black Creoles were no longer inextricably bound to the kitchens of slave owners. Many white Creoles either had to hire new cooks or learn their own way around a kitchen. Some tried to preserve recipes and techniques they’d once taken for granted, a point that Creole Cookery made directly and offensively: “In this time, glorious with the general diffusion of learning, it is befitting that the occult science of the gumbo should cease to be the hereditary lore of our negro mammies, and should be allowed its proper place in the gastronomical world.”
Both Creole Cookery and La Cuisine Creole appeared in 1885; the first two Creole cookbooks, they give a picture of the city’s cooking just two years after Twain’s visit. The books have many surprises, such as a beef-based “gombo.” But there are also dozens of dishes that could easily be served today—fried eggplant, stewed okra, ten styles of oyster, fifteen ways to cook fish. Meanwhile, Hearn wrote, peddlers walked the streets selling chickens, lemons, apples, and strawberries; many poked their heads through open windows, crying their wares. Twain himself marveled at the sheepshead, red snapper, and Spanish mackerel sold in “a very choice market for fish.” Much on the river had changed, but these things at least were still there. Probably Twain thought they always would be.
CROAKERS AND MULLETS FRIED
Have them perfectly cleaned; trim the fins, wipe the fish with a clean cloth, salt and pepper each one, and roll it in flour or fine corn meal, and then drop it into a pot of boiling lard and bacon grease mixed. When brown, pile up on a hot dish and serve, with any desired sauce or catsup.
—LAFCADIO HEARN, La Cuisine Creole, 1885
I’m a ruthless wedding hors d’oeuvre grazer; before waving hello to the bride, I’ll scope out the best bottleneck to snatch tidbits from passing trays. Servers will eye me warily, smile stiffly as they spin out of reach, even head for the back entrance.
Cruising the tables of the Louisiana Foodservice EXPO feels like crashing the world’s largest wedding. Every vendor offers samples—it’s only right—and so there’s andouille and fresh Gulf shrimp and tasso and smoked, shredded Berkshire pork and a dozen cuts of beefsteak and lobster bisque and seafood gumbo, and there are crab cakes and smoked duck and freaking foie gras, which I never ever get to eat. I miss the last of the paddlefish caviar by seconds. There’s also a great number of fine-looking vegetables and a few fruits, but in this kind of context I’m a carnivore (with, admittedly, frequent exceptions for pastries and the free and plentiful beer). There are also a tremendous number of seafood poppers and fried things various and sundry: some look bad and many are, and a few I can’t even identify, but I taste all of them anyway because, hey, you never can tell.
This is after a few days of eating way, way too much. I’d been surprisingly on edge before coming—stomach literally clenched, having trouble sleeping, the whole deal. New Orleans is, far and away, my favorite American