Easter cooking, Big Easy style
From gumbo to dessert, New Orleans holiday brings a family feast.
By C.W. Cameron
For the AJC
In New Orleans, much is centered around the table. “Food is everything,” said Lisa Rochon, a native of the city.
Elissa Eubanks,
eeubanks@ajc.com Traditional New Orleans cuisine Cod Fish Cakes simmer on the cook top and can be eaten on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday or Easter.
Elissa Eubanks,
eeubanks@ajc.com Gumbo z’herbes (pronounced “zab”) is the traditional main course for Holy Thursday.
“Even today, post-Katrina, if you go into somebody’s house in New Orleans, one of the first questions you’re going to be asked is, ‘Are you hungry? Do you want something to eat?’ Everything is still focused around food and family and friends,” she said.
Rochon’s family traces its roots back to the settling of New Orleans in the 1600s. Her mother’s family has owned restaurants or cooked privately for people for years.
Rochon ran the Riverside Cafe in New Orleans’ Riverwalk Marketplace for 11 years. She now lives in Atlanta but maintains her connection to her hometown’s food culture through her catering and event planning business.
New Orleans residents have food traditions for all occasions — weddings, funerals and even football. The meals served during Holy Week, the days leading up to Easter Sunday, follow their own rituals influenced by the city’s largely Catholic traditions.
Gumbo z’herbes (pronounced “zab”) is the traditional main course for Holy Thursday.
“This is the last chance to eat meat of any kind before Easter Sunday,” Rochon said.
This gumbo is traditionally made from at least five, and often many more, greens slowly simmered in a broth of chicken and beef stock flavored with ham and pork sausages.
“The core greens of mustard, collards, kale, spinach and turnips are always used,” Rochon said. Other greens such as cabbage and watercress are optional. The gumbo is seasoned with bay leaf and thyme.
Good Friday is a day of reflection and often includes fasting. Only the most necessary work is done, and the meal that breaks the fast is seafood.
Dinner for some families might be shrimp creole, but the traditional main course for the Rochons is cod fish cakes, made from soaked salt cod. Salt cod might seem like an odd choice for a city surrounded by Gulf waters and easy access to fresh seafood, but cod is an easily stored staple that adapts itself to a variety of recipes.
The cod fish cakes are served with potato salad made with celery, green onions, boiled eggs and homemade Creole-style mayonnaise prepared from boiled egg yolks rather than raw. Served with green peas or buttered green beans, that’s the meal. There is no dessert because it’s still Lent.
On the Saturday before Easter, the family matriarchs gather in the kitchen to begin preparations for Sunday’s meal. The children will also be in the kitchen, busy dyeing Easter eggs. While this work is going on, the family will enjoy oyster and artichoke soup or fried speckled trout.
“Easter usually signals the last chance to really enjoy oysters. Most New Orleanans don’t eat oysters without the month containing an R in the spelling. At the seafood market, oysters are obtained by the gallon, making sure to request extra oyster liquor, the liquid in the shell with the oyster. This is a prized ingredient for gumbo, and especially oyster dressing,” Rochon said.
Easter dinner could feature any number of dishes. Rochon rattled off just a few.
“There might be crawfish bisque, stuffed crab, smothered turtle or Court Bouillon [pronounced “coo-bee-yon”] made with redfish, or maybe a cold salad of poached redfish with marinated onions and celery, topped with homemade mayonnaise.
“Stewed rabbit might be on the table, or a veal dish called a ‘pocket,’ a thigh of veal stuffed with a dressing made of ground sirloin and oysters, garlic and seasoning, then rubbed with salt, black pepper and Creole seasoning, and cooked a bed of onions, thyme and garlic.”
A ham or a beef roast or even some quail might also be served. All these dishes are accompanied again with potato salad, green beans and peas.
No matter the entree, gumbo is always the first course. And now that Lent is over, the desserts roll out: bread pudding with whiskey sauce, with or without a meringue topping; pecan pie or pecan cake; and homemade pralines and homemade fudge to have with coffee and chicory.
In Rochon’s home, Easter dinner will be served at 3 p.m. “My father was one of nine children, and my mother was one of 11. Easter could be anywhere from a dozen to three dozen people at the table.
“When people arrive for Easter Sunday, there will be an area set up for drinks, a glass of punch or lemonade or wine, and something to nosh on — hogshead cheese with crackers, deviled eggs, a hot crab dip or boiled shrimp,” she said.
With all that bounty, it’s no surprise when Rochon says that no one in New Orleans eats a meal in under an hour, especially when it’s a holiday.
And if you’re from New Orleans, you’re likely to judge people by how quickly they eat. “Someone will say, ‘They can’t possibly be from here, they got up in an hour,’” she said with a laugh.
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