ERIc cormier

Lake Charles, LA

"Boudin is us." – Eric Cormier

Eric Cormier is a Creole by ancestry, a Cajun by culture, an African American by complexion, and a Lake Charles native with a newspaper column devoted to the foodways of his peoples—all of them. Eric grew up in a household where his mother was the “pot cook,” tending to the gumbos and étouffées, while his father simmered red sauces and replicated other dishes from the Italian/Sicilian lexicon that he learned on the job (his night job) at Papania’s restaurant. While Eric cannot envision ever matching his mother’s platonic gumbos, he is the main cook in his household today and finds pride in carrying forth the Louisiana tradition of men in the kitchen. While Eric’s wife, Erin, is from Kansas, she appreciates her marital food culture, and especially the concentration of boudin purveyors in the Lake Charles area. A perfect date? Sharing two pounds of boudin and some fried fish from Rabideaux’s in Iowa, Louisiana.

Listen to this 4–minute audio clip of Eric Cormier talking about the aspect of food writing that he enjoys most. [Windows Media Player required. Go here to download the player for free.]

NOTE: What follows is a portion of the original interview that has been edited for length. To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.

EDITED TRANSCRIPT

Subject: Eric Cormier
Date: September 11, 2007
Location: Pujo Street Café—Lake Charles, LA
Interviewer & Photograper: Sara Roahen

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Sara Roahen:  This is Sara Roahen for the Southern Foodways Alliance. It’s Tuesday, September 11, 2007. I’m in Lake Charles, Louisiana at Pujo Street Café with Mr. Eric Cormier. And could you say your full name and your birth date?

Eric Cormier:  Eric Cormier. I was born October 1st in 1971.

And your position in Lake Charles?

I’m a reporter for the American Press Newspaper. I split my time between covering City Hall, and 50-percent of my other time working as a food columnist.

Where did you grow up?

I grew up here in Lake Charles. I went to school here all the way through college. Graduated from McNeese State University and left only a short period of time to move into the deep, deep bayou I call it—Abbeville, Louisiana, where I worked at a newspaper there. [I] worked in Lafayette, Louisiana, in radio, and came back to Lake Charles.

Can you tell me a little bit about your ancestry on both sides?

Well I’m legally, as the federal government says, I’m African American. In Louisiana culturally I fall under the umbrella of—of what they call Creole with a mix of French, Cajun, some Native American, African American, and Spanish. Cormier, being my family on the French side, are from Saint Martinville, Louisiana. My mother’s parents—that’s my father’s parents, his father and—his mother was born on Cane River in a little town called Cloutierville, and she goes by the maiden name of Brevelle. And on my mother’s side, she’s a Prudhomme with her family originating out of Opelousas, Louisiana. And her mother went by the last name of Day, to which we find our family is up in Chicago.

And so do you—do you identify culturally, if not you know ancestrally, as Cajuns?

Yes. We have some connections to the Cajun culture because, like with so many families in South Louisiana, you see a—in my family a combination of both people of color or black, and people who are white co-mingling and having children. And I’m like a third generation as—child of light complexion. And living in Lake Charles, one of the things that I’ve learned is that as—I’m 35 right now and I’m getting—as I get older, I’m getting closer to my Creole heritage, especially in Natchitoches, Louisiana, where you have Cane River and then the Creole Heritage Foundation. And also I have family members who are from Saint Martinville, and honestly what’s called a little town—a little settlement called Cade, Louisiana, which is right out of Saint Martinville, which is right next door to New Iberia. So when it comes to food, that’s where my heritage really comes out, because I—we really truly identify with smothering food and making gravies, experimenting with smoked meats, boudin, wild game, which is if you have—it’s something that historically both blacks and whites in Louisiana have always loved whether it be rabbit or venison, wild—wild duck for gumbos and—. So culturally I feel connected, and it’s something that I like to define in this section of the state, whereas in New Orleans you have Creoles whose heritages is a little different than on this side of the state because—it hasn’t been written down, but there’s some folks here in this area who like to call ourselves Prairie Creoles because we come from areas like Lawtell and Saint Martinville where folks were farming. And they came to Lake Charles for work; that’s how my grandfather came here from Saint Martinville when he was like 12 years-old, and that’s on my dad’s side, the Cormier(s)—came here way back when. And with my grandfather on my mom’s side, the Prudhomme, Henry—Harry Prudhomme, he came here with his brother-in-law, [who] we called Uncle Antoine, looking for work right after World War II. And so a lot of African Americans or people of color came here after World War II because of the petrochemical industry, and they got those jobs and they settled here and called this home, and with that came their culture.

And how was the food down there [the Saint Martinville/Cade/Abbeville area] similar and different from the food that you grew up eating?

The similarities are gravy and rice. Sometimes they even call it a sauce. Now some people call it a sauce piquant; Creoles down there, well they just call it a sauce. Some roux, a little tomato sauce, little tomato paste, beef, pork, chicken, smoked sausage—anything that you have in the house; put it over some rice. And what was really cool is that as with here, down there the men do a lot of the cooking. Both my brother and I go to a hunting camp up in Arkansas, and what happens is a lot of folks down from Acadiana—Lafayette, Saint Martinville, that area—they drive up there too. And that’s where you really see the—the cooking style: very rustic, very basic, highly flavorful, with any meat that’s available with a big old pot. Got to have the big cast iron pot and a big spoon and some sharp knives, and whatever is out there that’s walking or swimming is dinner. And to take those real simple flavors and, and jack them up a notch, that’s—that’s the thing that I took from living down there. My mom, who I always say is the best pot cook I ever knew smothering chickens, smothering liver, smothering pork, gravies—one of my favorite all-time dishes is basically [Phone Rings] a—a smothered okra or shrimp and smoked sausage right over rice with tomato base. That’s something that it—it has that, a whole lot of similarities that you might find in black—from black families in New Orleans that carry it over and it—it jumped all the way to the other side of the state. But it—the ingredients might just be a little bit different in terms of what the wild game is—what people will eat [of] wild game on this side of the state and the other sides of the state. Especially the more cosmopolitan areas, they might not be putting deer backstrap [Laughs] in their red sauce. But that’s—that’s the—that’s the thing that I took from being down there, and even from the gumbos: dark, rich rouxs. They do that on this side too. But down there I learned a couple tricks from some old cooks. You know, drop an egg in there. [Laughs] And thicken that, you know—thicken that up a little bit. Sometimes it’s boiled. Sometimes I even saw raw eggs cracked and put in—put in the gumbo. When I would ask—and I was always told, Just eat it. [Laughs]

Your dad was a professional cook?

He worked in an Italian restaurant, Papania’s, which was here in Lake Charles for years. And actually I started going to Papania’s when I was like four or five. He would wake me up in the morning. He’d work at the railroad, come in late, about midnight, 1 o’clock; he goes, would wake me up: Do you want to come with me to the restaurant? ‘Cause he would make the sauce, the spaghetti sauce, the pizza sauce, for the next day, and so I would go with him as a little kid, and that’s when—at that time at the restaurant newspaper people used to be in there too. Well I would be with him in the kitchen and he would be doing his thing and I’d get—invariably I’d get thirsty, and the greatest treat in the world was a cherry soda, which was either 7-Up with cherry—cherry juice or a Coke with cherry juice added to it, and I would sit at the bar [Laughs] at the corner, and he would put me in there and I—and I would hang out with the waiters who were—who to this day were—still remember me now as—as an adult. And I just kind of grew up in the kitchen. I mean it just—I didn’t know how natural it was ‘til I was 22—23. So that’s how I got a real close association with what goes on—what goes on with seasoning and hanging around food and really learning to love the people who do it: the waiters, the cooks, the sous-chefs. You know, celebrity chefs don’t really mean much to me; it’s the people who really are sitting in the back peeling the potatoes, washing the dishes—that’s where I really feel like I got a connection with them, when I hear their stories and I’m able to tell their stories in the newspaper or in a magazine article, and that’s what’s important to me because if you—I think people forget. Your food just doesn’t come to you on a plate. There’s some no-named individual who doesn’t even think about it—they know it: they just do something marvelous and create something. They got it from their grandma and their mama, or their dad or uncle, and they’re just doing what they do, and that’s the thing I really, really appreciate especially about being in this side of the state. There’s no pomp and circumstance about eating and cooking. It’s survival, and at the same time it’s having a good time. And you can't have a good time if the food’s not good. [Laughs]

And are you the main cook in your household?

Definitely [Laughs]. My wife is from Kansas, so I’m the cook.

And that’s not unusual in this part of the country even-—even in New Orleans, I think a lot of men are the main cooks.

I’m actually working on a story right now for a magazine about smoked sausage and smoked meats, so I was on the road actually today, and I was talking to what we call old-timers, some old guys and—excuse me—. What they were telling me were these stories about their fathers and grandfathers—and we’re talking about the early 1900s—butchering the pig, and the men out there doing cracklings and making boudin, smothering pork steaks, barbequing and the whole nine yards, and that’s inherent in this culture. There’s one thing that I think that’s amazing and pretty cool is that men—and that’s on both sides of the color spectrum, black or white—in most communities when it comes to cooking, you won't find a man who’s going to run from the kitchen. And the ones who did, then their mama really was a doggone good cook. They had no reason to learn. [Laughs] But every guy I know personally cooks—even guys I went to high school with and their dads and their grandfathers, and really and truly those recipes are passed down. And the thing is, it’s not like it’s written down. You pick up the recipe watching as a little kid. And it’s amazing how much kids pick up when you’re five years-old and you’re outside with the guys and they’re passing around the whiskey bottle and drinking beer, joking, you know and playing the dozens—hanging out outside and the women are inside and—you’d just be amazed at how much you pick up and watch what these old guys do. And to me that’s what’s pretty cool, especially as a food writer. When I get a chance to go around some of the old-timers who are still alive, and they’re at a festival and they’re cooking, and just to sit there and watch them, and you feel a kinship with them because they’re doing the same thing that you did and have learned. And it just—you just feel at home. And that’s what makes writing about food, what makes watching these people even when I’m not worried about writing about food—you just feel this connection and it’s—it’s basic, and it’s not macho at all. It’s just guys who want to have good times and love cooking. And that’s—I love that.

Can you talk a little bit about how you and people of this area identify with boudin?

Boudin is us. If you look at the history, you really don’t know where it came from. You see the influences of Germany. You see the—the influences of Germany, you see the influence of France, but boudin is kind of like it just kind of happened. And when you research it, nobody can say definitively where it happened on this date. It just, it’s here. A joke around here is a lunch for us around here is boudin with a slice of bread and a beer. [Laughs] I eat boudin for breakfast ‘cause most stores that are open—smokehouses or convenience stores that sell boudin—they’re—excuse me—are open around 6 o’clock in the morning. You pass 8:00, 9 o’clock, that boudin is cooked; you get it and you go, and you get that waxed paper and you turn to that stuff and it’s just simple. It’s no—it’s not pretentious. It’s just a food that you get into your system, and I always tease my friends who come from the northern parts of the country or the far out West or people who have left Louisiana and moved away, had children and those children come back; it’s a—you know, and the term I’m going to use is kind of derogatory, but it’s one we use freely. It’s—you’re not coon-ass until you have a piece of boudin. I mean you can eat boiled crawfish or crabs or fry some fish, but you’re not a bona fide Louisianian until you have a piece of boudin. I’ve yet to hear someone say that they didn’t like it. The only time I heard something even remotely close was two years ago, some Russian chefs came here as part of an exchange and they fed them some boudin and I was there. And each and every one of those chefs’ faces was red, they were sweating, and you could tell that they were scared to say it was too hot. But the—when I asked, Well, was it good? You know, Da. [Laughs]

Meaning Yes?

Yes, meaning yes, so it’s like it’s special. You can't define it; you can't even tell where it came from, but it’s everywhere. People make it at home. People make it in stores. I just—again, the story I’m working on right now, a guy, he makes 100,000-pounds of—he produces 100,000-pounds of meat every month; 200—2,000-pounds of that is boudin, and that’s per week. He’s making boudin all the time, Rabideaux’s boudin, one of the best in the area. And recipes are different, but the difference that you will find in our boudin compared to what you see in other parts of the state like Lafayette and the Houma area, is that we don’t have as much liver. Liver is—liver or not to liver: that’s the question. And over here liver really, really—a whole lot of liver, our tastes, our palates don’t like a lot of liver in our boudin. If we’re going to eat liver we’re going to eat liver broiled or, you know, with grits, and that’s just how we do it. But boudin is truly a South Louisiana deal even though you’ll find it south of Alexandria. But down here it’s—again, we take it for granted, but that’s our identity. It’s like a Philly cheesesteak sandwich in Philadelphia. You come down here you get boudin, and you go to Texas—East Texas—you’re going to get Texas hot links, hot guts. Over here is boudin, so that’s pretty much it.

That term coon-ass, which I even have a hard time saying because it sounds so derogatory to me [Laughs]—but it seems like people in this part of Louisiana call themselves that. People of both races. Is that true?

Well [Sighs] Cajuns call themselves coon-asses. I’ve—I’m Creole, I’m black, but I’ve been called a coon-ass, but it stops there. [Laughs] You won't really find many people in the African American community who will call themselves coon-asses, but it will be a joke if you have some Creole heritage. Now that’s not always, but you know people look at me, in Louisiana they know what my heritage is. When I leave the state I’ve been asked if I’m Arab; I had a guy from Morocco come up to me thinking—asking me if I was from Fez. And when I’m in California I’m asked if I’m Mexican. When I’m with my friends from Venezuela, they’ve always told me, Your family has to be from South America. And so that—that coon-ass term, especially with my last name Cormier, yeah. I’ve been—if you’re—if you’re light-skinned and African American or you’re a Cormier or a Thibodaux, people will ask you if you’re a coon-ass. [Laughs]

We were talking a little bit the other night; I was asking you if you knew any black/African American boudin makers, because I haven’t met any on the road who are, you know, owner-operators.

Not many owner-operators that I know of even on this side of the state, but when you asked me that, it hit—it hit me about a day later. Right around the block from where I grew up was a lady who made boudin. And it was pretty good. But for the most part when it comes to retail sales, you don’t find a lot of African Americans doing the business, but they make it at home and only for family, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. I always noticed that when it comes to dishes like that, folks like to cook it in the fall, and you always hear people say, When it ain’t hot. [Laughs] That’s what they say: When it cools off I’ll make you some boudin; that’s what they tell you. So for some reason they just never really got into it, but again the same story I’m working on, I met a guy today who works for Rabideaux’s, and he’s been working at Rabideaux’s for 10 years. He retired from a utility company and he stuffs the boudin.

He’s­—he’s black; he’s Creole. I venture to say if you probably went around Opelousas or Lawtell you might run into some folks, but still I think when it comes to the African American community, when it comes to the boudin, I think it’s a family thing where they cook it together and they share it with their friends and that’s it. Why? I haven’t the slightest clue; I haven’t even gotten that far. I’m still—I’m still trying to find them myself. [Laughs]

What about your wife? I’m curious whether she’s taken to boudin, and she’s not a Louisiana native.

It’s her most favorite thing in the world. She gets on me if she hears that I’m eating boudin somewhere and I don’t bring her any—I’m in trouble. It’s her—I mean that’s—she could eat boudin every day. That’s—and it surprised me. She was born in Kansas. Her dad is Irish and her mom is Filipino, and she likes boudin. I don’t—I haven’t understood it, but she’s a coon-ass. [Laughs]

I wanted to ask you about your favorite places to eat—or a few of your favorite places to eat boudin, like if you and your wife were going to go on a hunt.

Starts in Vinton, Louisiana, a place called Comeaux’s, which I think has the best boudin in Calcasieu Parish; drive down Highway 90 from Vinton to Sulphur about 20-minutes and go to the Boudin Link; drive into Lake Charles—.

Sorry—Boudin Link or Sausage Link?

Sausage Link. And drive into Lake Charles and go to Hackett’s, Abe’s, and go on through to Moss Bluff, Louisiana, which is the north part of the Calcasieu Parish—a place called Peto’s, which makes the hottest boudin in the state if you ask me. It’s red. It is not blood boudin. It’s red because of the cayenne. It’s kicking. And that’s—oh, I end up in Iowa, Louisiana, at Rabideaux’s, which me and my wife, we drive there at least two or three times a month. And it’s just 10-minutes from Lake Charles, but it’s out of Lake Charles, and two pounds of boudin with some fried fish and we got lunch.

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To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.

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