After a blissful week in New Orleans we decided it was time to get a move on.  The next destination:  Texas.

Texas, to me, is a strange place.  Just as some folks find Manhattan overwhelming, Texas is just too much for me.  The state is huge land mass full of people that I know nothing about.  We decided to make our first stop Austin, Texas in order to ease the pain but I was still reluctant.  To placate my fears, we planned on stopping in Lafayette, Louisiana beforehand to prep ourselves.

You may have never heard of Lafayette; there isn’t much there.  Everyone from New Orleans told us that the only thing to do outside of the city is eat.  “Cajun country,” they call it.

I had my own personal ambitions for Lafayette: Boudin. 

Boudin—pronounced boo-dan—is a mixture of rice, pork and spices in a sausage casing.  It looks like your typical sausage but tastes much lighter, like a portable, knockwurst-shaped jambalaya.  You can’t get authentic boudin in New Orleans.  In fact, the folks I met there enlist someone to drive north every couple of weeks and stock up a cooler to distribute once they arrive back home. 

I’ve yearned to sample boudin ever since I’ve read about it.  Various stomach-minded authors have written of the wonders of boudin, and I made it my intention to go to the source and eat some.  Luckily for me, the source happened to be a small, nondescript market called Best Stop, just outside of Lafayette. 

We stopped at Best Stop and stocked up.  A half-pound of cracklins (pork bits fried in pork fat), a bag of homemade jerkey, a pound of boudin and a small chocolate dough pie for dessert.  The cracklins never made it to the hostel.  Once we parked the car I immediately tore open the boudin casing and slurped the delicious filling. 


I instantly understood why folks from all over Louisiana praise the delicious treat.  It was rich and meaty but light at the same time.  After a few bites your mouth was tinged with a pleasant spicy tingle that only could only be satiated by another bite.  To put it another way, boudin is a tidy, compact and portable taste of the Bayou.  Simple, delicious.  I made sure to stock up my little cooler.  Boudin would be a part of my diet for the next week.


This unassuming market is home to some of the most delicious food I’ve tasted since I crossed the Mason-Dixon line.