Lately, I've been craving some beefy noodles in a rich broth, something close to ya ka mein. Don't worry that you're not up on your Cajun or Creole foods if you've never heard of it--it's neither. Ya ka mein is a soup with these main characters: beef, soy sauce, and spaghetti noodles, topped with green onions and a hard-boiled egg. You see it at festivals, fundraisers, and Jazz Fest, and rarely anywhere else. Here's a little background on it, from the Gulf Aid concert in 2010:
The other day I was behind a lady buying two full loaves of po-boy bread, and the check-out guy said, "You making some po-boys?" And she said, "Naw, I'm gonna feed the ducks." You should've seen the sad look on that man's face. But I started dreaming about duck po-boys...because I had Po-Boy Fest on the brain! Seriously, I'd been waiting for it for months, because I'd never made it out to that particular fest. The whole thing lasts a mere 9 hours, so you've got to get up and get yourself there, and the earlier the better, before the booths sell out. I went looking for po-boys I don't see on menus, for some new experiences. I could only handle two, but they were mighty tasty. Below, One's pate and pickled vegetables (rich & vinegary):
Last Sunday, we went to the Gulf Aid benefit concert with some dear friends. It was an enchanting, oh-so-New-Orleans kind of event: walking through Mardi Gras World, where hundreds of floats and float adornments are created and stored; sampling soundly delicious seafood creations by some of the city's best restaurants and caterers; watching the tugboats and barges troll along the Mississippi; listening to heartfelt, intensely dedicated performers like Tab Benoit call us to attention, lest we forget whom we need to help; chanting "Who Dat?!" spontaneously, like a family, because we are a family.
Singing "You Are My Sunshine"--our state song--a capella, at the tops of our voices. You hardly ever hear the final Louisiana-specific verses, and we didn't sing them either, but here they are, in all their sweetness:
Believe me when I tell you that a couple of weeks ago, when I was dead-set on filling out a nice, long post with photos of the Creole Tomato/Louisiana Seafood/Cajun-Zydeco festival throwdown, I had no idea that it would be so hot down in the French Quarter.
I love these little guys. I ate them.
Cajun fish taco. I asked for a small portion of slaw so I could really taste the fish. It's a lightly fried tilapia filet, dusted with just a bit of Cajun seasoning (like a mixture of cayenne, garlic powder, thyme, salt, pepper). Really nice and simple-tasting, a good thing to eat in the heat.
Shrimp-and-crab-stuffed Creole tomato. This was the perfect dish to "marry" the two food festivals together. Creole tomatoes are the jewels of the summer season here in Louisiana--people talk about them all year, either how much they miss them or how much they love them. They don't really look different from regular tomatoes, to me, but the taste is something special. Denser, sunnier, redder. I devoured every last seed of this tomato.
We had some other yummies--crawfish sausage, hurricane sno balls--but they didn't make it to the photo stage. If you can stand the heat, this festival trio, known as the "Vieux To Do," is really something. Tons of food, great vendors, fun music. This year it was held the weekend of June 13-14, so I'd assume next year it will be sometime close to that.
