Cane River Stories » Food Ways

Cane River Creoles – The Turtle

Thomas — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 19:29:10 +0000

When you fish with limb lines sometimes you get more than you expect. That was the case one morning when Phil and Woody went out to check on their lines. As we slowly came upon one of the lines near the bank – they could tell they had hooked something big. At first they thought it might be a catfish, but then the tail made an appearance above the water line – it was no catfish, but a turtle. A large alligator snapping turtle that is not to be taken lightly. It can remove fingers from your hand and break bones. After wrangling it into the boat they had the dubious task of getting it ashore and securing it safely. It remained in a large, plastic tank behind the big house for others to check out for a couple of days before meeting an untimely end and becoming turtle soup.

Cane River Creoles – The Hog

Thomas — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 17:43:26 +0000

When the weather turns cold the LaCaze family goes hog hunting, and if they’re not shooting hogs, they’re trapping them. When you collect hundreds of pounds of hog meat you can’t eat it all, and often times they’ll give it to friends. So one afternoon Woody shows up with a wild boar in a cage he got from the LaCazes. They normally don’t just slaughter and eat a boar right away. The meat of a boar (a male hog) is much more musky and gamey than a sow. So what do you do? Effectively turn the boar into a sow by removing the testicles, which isn’t as easy as it sounds! Then keep it penned up and well feed for about a month, giving the hormones time to filter out. Then it’s ready for sausage and cracklins!

Cane River Creoles – Getting the Crawfish

Thomas — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 07:14:51 +0000

When it’s in season, crawfish is a staple of the Creole diet, and behind the Delphin Big House, they harvest their very own right out of the ground. After straightening out empty traps, we headed to the back woods to collect the traps already in the bayou, and bait and put out new ones.