Cajun vs. Creole gumbo: Why so different?
NEW ORLEANS (WGNO) — There exists an age-old debate in Southeast Louisiana. That being, which gumbo is better, Creole or Cajun? While locals continue to disagree on that question, some have taken to answer one that’s even more foundational: Why are they so different in the first place?
According to information written by Stanley Dry for the Southern Foodways Alliance, an organization based out of the University of Mississippi’s Center for the Study of Southern Culture which studies food in the American South, the origins of gumbo are highly speculative, but a bit is still known about its early days.
In the article, Dr. Carl A. Brasseaux with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette said references to gumbo in both Cajun and Creole parts of Louisiana seem to emerge around the same time, with its first appearance in New Orleans in 1803, over 200-years ago, and its second appearance only one year later on the Acadian Coast.
In those early days of gumbo, a consensus of its ingredients didn’t yet seem to be formed. The word for gumbo comes from a West African word for okra, and yet early gumbos, just as today, were divided between the use of okra or filé for thickening of the dish.
Clear cultural lines also hadn’t yet been drawn regarding other ingredients, with early cookbooks such as Lafcadio Hearn’s “La Cuisine Creole,” published in 1885, listing chicken, ham, bacon, oysters, crab, shrimp and beef as some of the potential ingredients while, oddly enough, leaving roux out entirely.
Looking more broadly at Cajun and Creole foods as categories, The Gregory, a restaurant in Baton Rouge, sheds some light that may help explain gumbo’s modern-day differences.
According to the restaurant, Creole food decidedly came to Louisiana first, originating in the early-to-mid 18th century with the wealthier, American-born Spanish and Portuguese combined with African and Native American influences. The unique demographic, combined with their geographical location along the Mississippi river, made for a more luxurious and varied style of cooking that incorporated more expensive and diverse ingredients like tomatoes, okra, butter and seafood.
Cajuns, on the other hand, found their origins in the latter half of the 18th century after the French settlers of Acadiana left and settled to the southwest of Louisiana, building a more simplistic and French-inspired culinary tradition that relied heavily on products that could be farmed or hunted by hand such as pork, chicken and lard.
Over time, it appears that the geographical differences between Cajuns and Creoles made the biggest difference in the development of their gumbos, with the article referring to Cajun food as “country food” and Creole as “city food.”
If a generalization is to be made, it would be that in the modern world, Creole gumbo may have tomatoes, will be thickened with okra, may have a butter-based roux and will likely be made with seafood. A Cajun gumbo, however, will often have a darker, lard or vegetable oil-based roux, and focus on more basic main ingredients that rural farmers would have had access to in the past, such as chicken, sausage, and filé for thickening.
With that said, Dry emphasizes that such generalizations are just that, generalizations. He explained how he had encountered many varieties of gumbo during an interview at a competition.
Dry noted that some contestants preferred lighter roux, around the color of a brown paper bag, while others insisted that it should be the same shade as a dark chocolate. Similarly there was wide debate on the thickness of gumbo, with a banker aiming for a light “gumbo juice” while a cook’s ideal was meant to be thick, similar to rice and gravy or a stew.
Beyond those differences, an investigation into more broad gumbo types throughout Louisiana and the greater New Orleans area will have an observer finding that Cajun gumbo sometimes contains okra, while creole gumbo sometimes contains chicken, and that either of them may contain eggs. Such variations only scratch the surface while also defying the generalized norms of what gumbo “should be” throughout different regions.
As such, the answer to the question of why Creole and Cajun gumbos are so different can likely be found in the same way any of the countless unique traditions exist in the great state of Louisiana, that is, by looking to the diversity of its people, along with their cultural backgrounds, and seeing how those backgrounds have mingled and transformed over the years.
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