Gumbo Life

December 1, 2018
Affectionate portrait of that favorite Cajun comfort food and the tradition from which it came.Down on the bayou, it's all about the gumbo, the overstuffed soup that babies eat "as soon as they go off the breast or the bottle." Now, bayou has a specific meaning, and former Wall Street Journal writer Wells (The Good Pirates of the Forgotten Bayous: Fighting to Save a Way of Life in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina, 2008, etc.) opens with a glossary of key terms, including that one, which describes a riparian ecosystem that "provided habitable high ground in a place where high ground was rare" for the Cajun, or Acadian, French-descended refugees who arrived there after being expelled from British Canada nearly 250 years ago. Gumbo itself derives from an African word for okra, a key ingredient, along with sausage, shrimp, bell peppers, and always rice. Beyond that, there are spices of various sorts, making the gumbo peppery or mild, simple or savory. One is filé, a powder made of ground sassafras leaves, whose "application in gumbo was subject to a rather robust debate even in the deepest part of the Gumbo Belt," namely whether it goes in while the gumbo is cooking or as it is cooling off. As the author notes, gumbo is not, strictly speaking, a Cajun invention, since it owes so much to West African antecedents, but nowhere has it become quite so elevated than Louisiana. From there, Cajun cooking has spread around the world. For instance, Paul Prudhomme's concoction of spices for blackened redfish has found a welcome home in Greece. Gumbo allows for experimentation, which "requires confidence and willing guinea pigs," though traditionalists will argue about that, too. In one cook-off, Wells, who grew up in the bayou, encountered gumbos made with tried-and-true hog lard, duck, and shrimp, with the most exotic thing being rabbit ("My mother would put rabbit in her sauce piquant but would never think of putting it in her gumbo"). The author closes his gently spun tale with a few recipes that foodies will want to test immediately.A tasty treat.

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February 1, 2019

The latest from journalist (Wall Street Journal) and fiction writer (Logan's Storm) Wells is a mixture of culture, cooking, history, and memory. Much of the book is a search for the roots and cultural place that gumbo occupies in Louisiana's bayous food landscape. The narrative is shaped by his travels throughout the Gumbo Belt region and includes interviews and stories from and about gumbo experts: both professionals (chefs John Folse and Leah Chase) and home cooks (former Louisiana senator Allen Ellender and the author's relative Beverly Freeman). The last part focuses on Wells's own memories of growing up in Black Bayou. This section is a wistful remembrance that highlights a way of life that has been increasingly lost, as the Creole and Cajun cultures and food traditions have become largely commercialized. Wells invites readers in with his folksy tone and easygoing outlook, and he sees hope that greater attention to the area may highlight more solutions to the region's problems. VERDICT Fans of regional American cooking, history, and storytelling will enjoy this literary ramble in the Louisiana Gumbo belt.--Ginny Wolter, Toledo Lucas Cty. P.L.

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2019
Louisiana's Cajun territory stands as a sustained ethnic culture unique to America. These outcasts from British Canada have retained French as their language, but due to their southern Louisiana isolation from other Francophones, their dialect evolved uniquely from its seventeenth-century origins in rural France. But while the language may have held steady, Cajun/Creole cooking incorporates strains from Africa, Italy, France, Germany, and more. Wells, who delights in playing with language to create sound pictures ( roux awakening, roux bayou ), has meticulously traced these influences, and he has visited a host of eateries to find every sort of variation on gumbo, from the most high-toned French Quarter restaurants to the celebrated historic precincts of Leah Chase's iconic diner. Ten different gumbo recipes close out the book, and it's likely that readers will have trouble deciding which to cook first. Anyone fondly recalling gumbo in its myriad guises will find plenty to savor here.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)