Andouille Cajun

In 1755, the Grand Dérangement, the forced deportation of the French-speaking Acadians of Nova Scotia by the British, scattered thousands of families. After years of wandering, some settled in the bayous of Louisiana from the 1760s. These refugees brought with them the French andouille: an offal sausage stuffed into a wide casing, as it was made in France, notably in the west, from which the Acadians came. In two generations, the French offal sausage had become a pork sausage smoked over local wood, spiced with the chillies of the New World, with nothing left of the original speciality but the name.

Pecan wood is the most distinctive element. The pecan, a tree endemic to the Louisiana bayous, produces a lightly sweet smoke. Some artisanal producers of LaPlace practise a two-stage smoking: a first phase at low temperature for the penetration of the smoke, then a second at a higher temperature to ensure cooking to the core. These nuances of protocol are jealously guarded from one family to another.

LaPlace, a small town forty kilometres from New Orleans, regards itself as the world capital of the Cajun andouille and holds an annual festival dedicated to the speciality. The artisanal production of LaPlace is marked by a higher proportion of garlic and a longer smoking time than in the rest of Louisiana. In the western Acadian parishes (St Landry, Evangeline, Acadia), the andouille is often finer in calibre and less smoked, thyme and bay taking more room than cayenne.

Its culinary use is inseparable from the three pillar dishes of Cajun cooking. In gumbo (the emblematic Louisiana stew blending African, Amerindian, French and Spanish influences), it is the aromatic pivot. In jambalaya (a one-pot rice dish), it structures the seasoning. Monday's dish of red beans and rice is a tradition that originated on laundry day, when people needed a dish that didn't require constant attention, as the red beans simmered for several hours.