I'm late reporting on the annual tradition of gumbo z'herbes on Maundy Thursday at Dooky Chase Restaurant. An old-time Creole custom with a long history, this hearty green gumbo is supposed to be served on Holy Thursday (old-fashioned liturgical term, Maundy Thursday) to prepare yourself for the rigors of fasting all day on Good Friday. And just because most folks have given up the idea of fasting completely on Good Friday does not negate the importance of gumbo z'herbes!
The traditional recipe for the gumbo, which of course varied a little from family to family, contains a number of greens -- the exact number of which and consisting of what could ignite heated controversy amongst passionate New Orleanians -- plus a heckuva lot of MEAT, from chicken to pork to veal to beef. Mrs. Leah Chase uses 9 different greens, and it is said that a person will make the same number of new friends in the year to come as the umber of greens in the gumbo, so I guess I'm primed now for those 9 new friends.
Several times I have labored over Miss Leah's recipe in my own kitchen, sometimes having to visit more than one market to obtain the requisite variety of greens. Most memorable to me was the spring I made it in Chattanooga, Tennessee. As I was checking out at the local grocery store with turnip greens, mustard greens, carrot tops, spinach, beet tops, dark kale, and dandelion greens (a real coup, I thought) in my cart, the clerk, a young light-skinned African-American woman looked sharply at me and said (to my complete and utter amazement!), "Are you making that special gumbo?" "How did you know that?" I stammered out and she explained that her "Ma-Maw" was from Louisiana and always made this special green gumbo before Easter.
Russell, a long-time friend of mine, a local politico and lobbyist for progressive causes, always reserves a private dining room at Dooky's for this occasion, and has been doing this every year, going all the way back to the days when Dutch Morial was first running for mayor. One of the hardships of living "in exile" all those years I lived away was knowing that back home in New Orleans, Dooky's was serving gumbo z'herbes, hot politics were being hotly discussed, and I had to miss it. (Russell used to make me even more homesick by sending me photos of the event that had appeared in the New Orleans media.) Now that we are home for good, there's no reason to miss it and every reason to go.
When Big Man and I arrived a little after 12 noon, Dooky's was already packed. You couldn't park in the parking lot, or anywhere in the immediate vicinity of the building. We had to park a block away, on the side of the empty space where the Tremé Housing Project used to be, and make our way back to the front door. Folks were lined up from the door to the dining room all the way down to the bar and then along the bar. Big Man hesitated -- he doesn't like to cut ahead of people -- but I knew this wasn't a line for the folks going to the Gold Room.
We "'scused us" through all the people waiting and made our way to the French doors at the entrance to the Gold Room (so hard to remind yourself that this was once the ONLY dining room at Dooky's, before they added the 2 other next-door buildings and renovated them into more space). The usual assortment of Russell's relatives, elected officials (a smattering of local judges, a former state representative, a candidate or two), lawyers, ministers, journalists, and what-have you were already seated around an L-shaped arrangement of tables. The noise level was pretty high, what with the conversations at our L-table, and the cacophony in the main dining room, packed to the rafters with happy folks spooning down green gumbo.
Russell is an excellent host and he took us round the table, introducing us to those we might not have met before, and may not have remembered from previous Maundy Thursdays. Russ likes to split up couples if he can, so that conversation is more lively, so Big Man was seated near Sybil Morial, Dutch's widow, and I got a place on the other end of the table, near some folks I had met before.
Despite the hordes of people, service was swift -- I guess it's relatively easy to serve even the biggest crowd when you don't have to worry about menus! Platters of hot fried chicken were spaced conveniently around the table, needfully replenished often, and each person got a large bowl with a generous portion of gumbo z'herbes, with liberal amounts of various meats. Topping things off were baskets of hot sweet corn muffins that served (to me, at least) as dessert. It goes without saying (ça va sans dire) that everything that touched our lips was sublime.
Of course, politics was a common topic, with the current mayor coming in for well-deserved drubbing; the city council did not escape their share of the criticism. (Many of us, black and white across the table, agreed that the city had not been so racially polarized since the 1960s.) We shared ways that things had gotten better, and worse, in our lives and in the city since Katrina. We fondly recalled that the year before, the Holy Thursday that had marked the first time that Dooky's was opened for a seated public luncheon since Katrina. We remembered individuals who used to share this luch with us, but who were now in the Great Beyond. We talked about our children and our grandchildren. In short, it was a grand time.
With more hungry folks arriving, Big Man and I did not linger *too* long and left after eating and doing a little table-hopping to talk with more folks there. As we left, we passed another long line of folks still waiting to get in. I heard later from Miss Leah and a Dooky's waiter that they hadn't been able to close until after 6 pm!
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