page_title: Cajun cuisine
section_title: Meat and seafood
hierarchical_section_title: Cajun cuisine / Ingredients / Meat and seafood
caption_attribution_description: " Old Cajun woman reaching for strings of garlic suspended from rafters. Near Crowley, Louisiana". FSA photo by Russell Lee, October, 1938.
context_page_description: Cajun cuisine, is a style of cooking named for the French-speaking Acadian people deported by the British from Acadia in Canada, incorporating West African, French and Spanish cooking techniques, in region of Louisiana. Cajun cuisine is sometimes referred to as a 'rustic cuisine', meaning that it is based on locally available ingredients and preparation is relatively simple.
  An authentic Cajun meal is usually a three-pot affair, with one pot dedicated to the main dish, one dedicated to steamed rice, special made sausages, or some seafood dish, and the third containing whatever vegetable is plentiful or available. Crawfish, shrimp, and andouille sausage are staple meats used in a variety of dishes.
  The aromatic vegetables green bell pepper, onion, and celery are called the trinity by Cajun chefs in Cajun and Louisiana Creole cuisines. Roughly diced and combined in cooking, the method is similar to the use of the mirepoix in traditional French cuisine which blends roughly diced carrot, onion, and celery. Characteristic aromatics for the Creole version may also include parsley, bay leaf, green onions, dried cayenne pepper, and dried black pepper.
context_section_description: Cajun foodways include many ways of preserving meat, some of which are waning due to the availability of refrigeration and mass-produced meat at the grocer. Smoking of meats remains a fairly common practice, but once-common preparations such as turkey or duck confit (preserved in poultry fat, with spices) are now seen even by Acadians as quaint rarities.
  Game (and hunting) are still uniformly popular in Acadiana.
  The recent increase of catfish farming in the Mississippi Delta has brought about an increase in its usage in Cajun cuisine in the place of the more traditional wild-caught trout (the saltwater species) and red fish.
  Seafood
  Freshwater
  Bass
  Catfish
  Sac-au-Lait (white perch or crappie)
  Yellow perch
  Saltwater or brackish water species
  Trout
  Redfish
  Pompano
  Drumfish
  Flounder
  Grouper
  Perch - many varieties
  Snapper - many varieties
  Shellfish
  Crawfish (ecrevisse)- either wild swamp or farm-raised
  Shrimp, or Crevette ("Chevrette" in Colonial Louisiana French)
  Oysters
  Blue Crab
  Also included in the seafood mix are some so-called trash fish that would not sell at market because of their high bone to meat ratio or required complicated cooking methods. These were brought home by fishermen to feed the family. Examples are garfish, black drum also called gaspergou or just "goo", croaker, and bream.
  Poultry
  Farm-raised
  Turkey (and turkey confit)
  Chicken (and guinea hen)
  Game birds
  Dove
  Duck (and duck confit)
  Goose
  Quail
caption: Cajun woman reaching for strings of garlic suspended from rafters. Near Crowley, Louisiana, 1938.
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