Seniors Visit the “Andouille Capital of the World”

That just has to be LaPlace, Louisiana, senior friends. You may already know that andouille is normally a pork sausage, almost always smoked and heavily seasoned, typically with onions, garlic, cayenne or other hot chiles, black pepper and usually thyme.

There are as many versions as there are cooks, and LaPlace Louisianans guard their recipes closely. Historically LaPlace was settled as a small farming village in the 18th century and was named after an early settler, Basile Laplace. The city’s railroad station that was established in 1883 “put it on the map”.

LaPlace came up today on my CNN Travel information site so I wanted to check out the town and share it with you. You can see on this map that LaPlace lies between the southwest edge of Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River, only 25 miles west of New Orleans.

The Andouille Festival each October features Cajun food, a hotly contested andouille cooking competition as well as great zydeco and Cajun music. Seniors, if you don’t know what zydeco is, “google it!”

Andouille played an important role in the region’s cuisine history. The sausage was brought to the region by colonists from France. The Cajun people who settled in the swamps and bayous of the Mississippi Delta in the mid-eighteenth century came from Acadia in Nova Scotia, and were originally from the coastal regions of Brittany and Normandy. They spiced the French sausage up, and today it is a vital ingredient in gumbo, jambalaya, red beans and rice, and etoufee served with shellfish or chicken.

Seniors Drive The Great River Road

Attractions in LaPlace include some of the most historic antebellum plantations in the Gulf Coast region. From the early 1800s through the 1850s, dozens of these riverside mansions were built along a 70-mile stretch called the Great River Road that ran along on both sides of the Mississippi.

Today, only a few remain that are in decent shape, and enjoyable things to do in and around LaPlace include tours of these historic sites. Senior golfers, LaPlace is home to one of the best 18-hole course in the New Orleans area, the Riverlands Country Club.

Louisiana is swamp territory and some folks even feed alligators.  If you are adventuresome and up to it, maybe try the #2 most popular thing to do in LaPlace… an ATV Swamp Tour. Seniors, come on down to Louisiana, visit LaPlace, enjoy the food, each of the 64 parishes (French: paroisses), the Cajun atmosphere and very friendly people. jeb