noelleprice (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} noelleprice) wrote,@ 2006-12-24 18:11:00 |
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Coon-Ass Turducken
Some local friends of Habitat loaned the staff their house for our Thanksgiving dinner. The house had taken considerable Katrina damage, but with repairs and re-modelling nearly complete, it was really pretty breathtaking... particularly for those of us who had barely seen the inside of a house in months... at least not one with niceties like drywall and such. Here's a pic of our spread and a few of my teammates:
whole fandamily/ Kyle(Opie) Craig Meech
You know the widely-espoused idea that eskimos have a hundred words for snow, islanders tend to have a large number of words for shades of blue, and so on? From what I hear, this is generally an exaggerated notion, though we americans apparently have a phenomenal variety of words for types of fasteners - you know, screws, bolts, nails, staples and all the variations thereof - compared to people of other national origins. Honestly, it's hard for me to imagine doing without any of these terms. But maybe that's true for snows and blues too, depending on your perspective. At any rate, here in Louisiana I've been struck by the sheer multiplicity and variety of terms for... well... what we would crassly refer to as "rednecks". "Rednecks" is actually one of them, and the subculture it describes seems to overlap in some not-easily-defined way with the tribe referred to as Mullets. It is not clear to me whether one has to have a mullet to be a Mullet. But I'm pretty sure, conversely, that if you have one you are one. Then there are some distinctly New Orleanian urban varieties, such as the Yats, so called because of their oft-noted greeting, "Where y'at?". (The appropriate answer to this query, by the way, is "Awrite.") This group has an amplified subgroup known variously as "sweats" or "hey bras". Said with the proper tone, there is a usage of the word "cajun" that identifies yet another rural set. I've even occasionally heard people use the term "hillbilly". Since there are no hills here, and I mean _no_ hills, this is a designation reserved for some abstract idea of a variety of hick that might exist Somewhere Else. But I digress.
The point here is to acquaint you with my favorite breed of downhome Louisianan, the Coon-Ass. Don't blame me, that's just what they call themselves. Rock, born David Lawrence LaStrappes, is a self-proclaimed Coon-Ass. His origins are French and Sicilian, which as far as I can tell is a typical ethnic breakdown. The term also carries with it the connotation of a somewhat heroic but often comically self-destructive stubbornness. "Don't call a coon-ass a redneck unless you're trying to piss him off," says Rock, employing his best deep south sound. (Rock, by the way, is actually exceptionally articulate, but he prefers to reserve that for special occasions, largely for shock value.) "There's a difference. A redneck ain't got no sense. Coon-ass got sense, he just don't use it."
One of the glorious contributions of Coon-Ass kind to the world is the Coon-Ass Turducken. As a special twist on its more widespread southern counterpart - comprised of a chicken stuffed inside a duck stuffed inside a turkey - the making of the Coon-Ass variety involves also stuffing the chicken with shrimp. My New Orleanian friend Nick, unversed in such country ways, asked the obvious question, "But what do they stuff the shrimp with?" "Rice," I answered. This isn't strictly true - the chicken is actually stuffed with a shrimp and rice dressing - but I couldn't resist.
Anyway, here's a picture. I know it sounds like some kind of moral violation, especially to Californians, and maybe it is. But I'm here to tell you it was the highlight of my Thanksgiving meal. When in Rome, baby.
For any of you who are wondering about the logistics of how a turducken is constructed, here's Rock's summary: "It's a real pain in the ass." By the way, he shot the duck himself the weekend before.
Behold, the Turducken:
And here we have the Thanksgiving Picture of the Year... Van's family (Van is our on-staff plumber) engaging in the traditional post-turkey coma, plus a bonus shot from Halloween of me dressed as Van and Van dressed as Excessively Excited Corporate Volunteer Guy.
Some local friends of Habitat loaned the staff their house for our Thanksgiving dinner. The house had taken considerable Katrina damage, but with repairs and re-modelling nearly complete, it was really pretty breathtaking... particularly for those of us who had barely seen the inside of a house in months... at least not one with niceties like drywall and such. Here's a pic of our spread and a few of my teammates:
whole fandamily/ Kyle(Opie) Craig Meech
You know the widely-espoused idea that eskimos have a hundred words for snow, islanders tend to have a large number of words for shades of blue, and so on? From what I hear, this is generally an exaggerated notion, though we americans apparently have a phenomenal variety of words for types of fasteners - you know, screws, bolts, nails, staples and all the variations thereof - compared to people of other national origins. Honestly, it's hard for me to imagine doing without any of these terms. But maybe that's true for snows and blues too, depending on your perspective. At any rate, here in Louisiana I've been struck by the sheer multiplicity and variety of terms for... well... what we would crassly refer to as "rednecks". "Rednecks" is actually one of them, and the subculture it describes seems to overlap in some not-easily-defined way with the tribe referred to as Mullets. It is not clear to me whether one has to have a mullet to be a Mullet. But I'm pretty sure, conversely, that if you have one you are one. Then there are some distinctly New Orleanian urban varieties, such as the Yats, so called because of their oft-noted greeting, "Where y'at?". (The appropriate answer to this query, by the way, is "Awrite.") This group has an amplified subgroup known variously as "sweats" or "hey bras". Said with the proper tone, there is a usage of the word "cajun" that identifies yet another rural set. I've even occasionally heard people use the term "hillbilly". Since there are no hills here, and I mean _no_ hills, this is a designation reserved for some abstract idea of a variety of hick that might exist Somewhere Else. But I digress.
The point here is to acquaint you with my favorite breed of downhome Louisianan, the Coon-Ass. Don't blame me, that's just what they call themselves. Rock, born David Lawrence LaStrappes, is a self-proclaimed Coon-Ass. His origins are French and Sicilian, which as far as I can tell is a typical ethnic breakdown. The term also carries with it the connotation of a somewhat heroic but often comically self-destructive stubbornness. "Don't call a coon-ass a redneck unless you're trying to piss him off," says Rock, employing his best deep south sound. (Rock, by the way, is actually exceptionally articulate, but he prefers to reserve that for special occasions, largely for shock value.) "There's a difference. A redneck ain't got no sense. Coon-ass got sense, he just don't use it."
One of the glorious contributions of Coon-Ass kind to the world is the Coon-Ass Turducken. As a special twist on its more widespread southern counterpart - comprised of a chicken stuffed inside a duck stuffed inside a turkey - the making of the Coon-Ass variety involves also stuffing the chicken with shrimp. My New Orleanian friend Nick, unversed in such country ways, asked the obvious question, "But what do they stuff the shrimp with?" "Rice," I answered. This isn't strictly true - the chicken is actually stuffed with a shrimp and rice dressing - but I couldn't resist.
Anyway, here's a picture. I know it sounds like some kind of moral violation, especially to Californians, and maybe it is. But I'm here to tell you it was the highlight of my Thanksgiving meal. When in Rome, baby.
For any of you who are wondering about the logistics of how a turducken is constructed, here's Rock's summary: "It's a real pain in the ass." By the way, he shot the duck himself the weekend before.
Behold, the Turducken:
And here we have the Thanksgiving Picture of the Year... Van's family (Van is our on-staff plumber) engaging in the traditional post-turkey coma, plus a bonus shot from Halloween of me dressed as Van and Van dressed as Excessively Excited Corporate Volunteer Guy.
