A Common Pot: Creole Cooking on Cane River
From our Member Folklorist, Kevin McCaffrey

Cane River in Northern Louisiana is a seemingly timeless place where a close-knit community of Creole people have maintained their cultural and familial ties uninterrupted since colonial days. Food has always meant much to Louisianians whether they be French, Cajun, American, Indian or African, and so it is with the Creoles, whose foodways serve as a window into the past and present. Come with us to sample Gumbo, Turtle Etouffee, Macque Choux, Teacakes, and lots of other great dishes as the Cane River Creoles share their recipes and stories of the world.

Click here to purchase A Common Pot: Creole Cooking on Cane River.

I Always Do My Collars First (2007)
From our Member Folklorist, Conni Castille

The traditional, nurturing, and creative experience of ironing as told by Cajun women; broadcast on Documentary Channel, Louisiana Public Television, and recipient of the Louisiana Filmmaker Award, and acceptance and awards into numerous film festivals including Cannes and Hot Springs. Funded in part by Rowenta, in association with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s Folklore and Film Programs.

King Crawfish
From our Member Folklorist, Conni Castille

In King Crawfish we watch the Cajun spirit being poured out on a communal table, even as the wild harvest is diminishing. At the 50-year old Breaux Bridge Crawfish Festival we see everything Cajuns value take to the stage: their language, music, food, dance, and  crawfish. Thousands of pounds of crawfish get served up at the festival, most coming from their natural habitat, the Atchafalaya Basin. But in one small fishing community in the Basin, crawfishermen fight to retain their way of life.

If the crawfishermen fail to preserve their right to fish and to bring back the free-flowing water that the Basin’s wildlife needs to survive, we could be witnessing the last generation of wild harvest crawfishermen, and the loss of the largest swamp in the United States.

Click here to view the trailer for King Crawfish.

No One Ever Went Hungry
From our Member Folklorist, Kevin McCaffrey

This program is an intimate look into how Cajun culture sustains itself through food traditions, social spaces, mentoring, family values and an appreciation for Louisiana’s abundance of food ingredients and dishes. We’ve tracked everything from andouille to chaudin, oyster fricasse to boiled shrimp and crawfish bisque. We’ve traveled field to bayou to deep in the Atchafalaya Basin. We can tell you where specialty meats are to be found and who’s got the best (commercial) boudin. Collaborating once again with Director of Photography Neil Alexander, who has filmed all our food documentaries, we haven’t ignored Mamou, Pierre Part or Delcambre. Neil’s work has established the unusual insider’s perspective that is our signature. Now to make it all into a good story that will surprise and delight you and maybe even change your mind about what Cajun cooking really is!!!

Click here to view the trailer for No One Ever Went Hungry.

Raised on Rice and Gravy (2009)
From our Member Folklorist, Conni Castille

A short film about the authentic experience of neighborhood “plate-lunch houses,” little known to any but the locals, where the genuine traditions of Cajun and Creole cooking can still be found, creating a space and experience that nourishes the body as well as the soul of a culture, where black and white, blue collar and white collar, come together for plain talk and to share their common culinary heritage: rice and gravy. Best Short Documentary, and numerous film festivals, including Cannes. Funded by the Louisiana Division of the Arts, in association with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s Folklore and Film Programs.

We Live to Eat: New Orleans’ Love Affair With Food
From our Member Folklorist, Kevin McCaffrey

New Orleans’ food history and traditions and whether they would live on after Hurricane Katrina are explored in this documentary, produced by e/Prime Media and Kevin McCaffrey for The Historic New Orleans Collection in combination with an exhibit featuring artifacts and prints exploring the same theme. With a lively soundtrack of food related songs by New Orleans musicians, it discusses the culture of the markets, the African, French, Spanish and Italian food influences in New Orleans and the cultural history of Creole culinary and social traditions that live on today. Will they survive displacement and Americanization?

Click here to view the trailer for We Live to Eat.