Postcard Project returns
When I started the first Postcard Project in 2022, I expected it to be a one-off thing.
I was wrong.
This year’s Postcard Project begins with Memorial Day and runs through Labor Day, Sept. 1. I anticipate an uptick in the arrival of postcards, but the truth is that these days, I receive postcards year-round from people I don’t know — and each one makes my heart go pitter-patter Just last week, I received four from Dru Troescher
Because some people send postcards so frequently, I feel like I’ve gotten to know them even if we’ve never met. In the last few weeks, I received four postcards from Troescher — from Indiana, Illinois, Ohio and Arkansas.
The first was from the Ohio State Capitol Building. Troescher happened to be there on the anniversary of the day President Abraham Lincoln laid in state there for eight hours.
“He then continued on his train trip to Springfield, Illinois, his burial site,” Troescher wrote, adding that they were on their way to visit the Capitol building and Lincoln’s Presidential Library in Springfield next.
Once there, she found another postcard, but not at the state capitol.
“The Illinois Capitol did not have a gift shop, so we went to the Illinois State Museum. It was free and very nice — lots about fossils and natural history We’re on our way to Independence, Missouri, to see the Truman Library,” Troescher wrote from Springfield.
I did not receive a postcard from Troescher at the Truman Library in Missouri, but she delivered in Indiana, but, once again, not from the Capitol building, which did not have a gift shop. The intrepid Troescher went to the University of Notre Dame and found a beautiful postcard to send, representing Indiana.
On her way back to Baton Rouge, she stopped at the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock and sent a postcard from there Her thoughtful stops and notes add to the fabric of this project. I’ve never met Troescher, but I appreciate her dedication to the project.
There are a few people who have, through the years of this project, sent so many postcards or such interesting postcards and messages that I have become friends with them — good friends, in fact. Just yesterday, I had lunch with a friend in New Orleans who is a direct result of the Postcard Project!
Each summer, the goal is to get postcards from every state and as many countries as possible. I encourage you to give it a try Taking the time to write and mail a postcard on the road adds a different dimension to travel.
Rifling through the bounty of the 2024 Postcard Project, in which we received more than 272 postcards from all 50 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and 34 other countries, I can’t help but be touched by the sincerity of the messages and amused by the obvious humor and ingenuity of some of the postcards sent in — not to mention being awed by the many vintage postcards people have sent in
As evidenced by Troescher’s effort to find postcards, the near relic from
ä See RISHER, page 2G
Robert Ballard’s exploration boat, Nautilus, documented the wreckage of the German submarine U-166 in the Gulf of Mexico in 2014. The wreck is considered a war gravesite and cannot be disturbed.
PROVIDED PHOTO
A LIFE IN FOOD
Marcelle Bienvenu dishes on étouffée,
Ella, Emeril and a life steeped in Louisiana flavor
BY JAN RISHER | Staff writer
Spending a spring afternoon with Marcelle Bienvenu in her St. Martinville kitchen and garden is like stepping into a Cajun waltz — colorful, unhurried, layered and playful Volunteer zinnias are blooming thick as a polka-dot blanket. Nine different birds are singing. The grand dame of Louisiana Cajun cooking is making crawfish étouffée just the way her mama taught her
To be clear, her mother, Rhena Broussard Bienvenu, called it a “stew-fay.”
“Everybody has their own way to do anything,” Bienvenu said. “As long as you think it tastes good, it’s fine with me, but as soon as I see a brown étouffée, oh no.”
ä See BIENVENU, page 2G
BY ROBIN MILLER Staff writer
A 1982 portrait of Marcelle Bienvenu and her beloved late mother, Rhena Broussard Bienvenu
PROVIDED PHOTO FROM MARCELLE BIENVENU
Reality can be stranger than fiction, but sometimes the two intersect, as it did when Sharon Coldiron recently was reading James Lee Burke’s 1994 novel, “Dixie City Jam.” In it, the best-selling author’s main character, Dave Robichaux, finds himself at the center of a conflict between opposing forces who want to raise a sunken Nazi U-boat only miles from Louisiana’s coast.
MARCELLE BIENVENU’S ROUX GUIDE
How dark does Beinvenu like her roux?
“It depends on what I’m cooking,” she said. For seafood gumbo or crab stew, she says the roux should be the color of peanut butter.
For a chicken and sausage gumbo, it should be brown, but not as dark as a Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Bar. For meatball stew, it should be dark brown, “darker than chicken and sausage gumbo roux,” she said.
Jan Risher
LONG STORY SHORT
STAFF PHOTO BY BRAD BOWIE
Marcelle Bienvenu prepares her Crawfish Stew-Fay on May 15 at her home in St. Martinville.
And her voice trails off, because a brown étouffée is where she draws the line
“We gonna do it Mama’s way,” she said. “It’s so simple. It takes me half an hour.”
As she added the onions to the pot she recalled a visitor who asked how long making the étouffée would take, to which Bienvenu answered, “About 45 minutes.”
“She says, ‘Oh, I thought I was gonna be here for three hours,’” Bienvenu said with a laugh. “And I said, ‘No, anything that takes three hours or is ‘day one/day two,’ that is not for me.’”
‘Her life in food’
The author of the 1991 classic “Who’s Your Mama, Are You Catholic, and Can You Make a Roux?” and a host of other cookbooks Bienvenu has witnessed — and helped shape — many milestones in the rise of Louisiana cuisine Her résumé winds through the kitchens and careers of Louisiana’s culinary greats and it’s hard to say who inspired whom along the way Bienvenu met renowned New Orleans restaurateur Ella Brennan in the early 1970s when she was working on a Time Life book with a photographer and researcher who wanted to learn about Cajun Country That was a time when Bienvenu says she didn’t even know she lived in Cajun Country. Brennan invited her to come work at Commander’s Palace.
“Ella and I would sit between shifts,” Bienvenu remembers. “She and I would sit on the patio, and she would tell me about New Orleans food. And I would tell her about Cajun food.”
In 1975, when Brennan was weighing whether to bring Paul Prudhomme to Commander’s Palace as its first American chef, she talked it over with Bienvenu, who was then working in the Commander’s catering division.
In 1982, when Brennan considered hiring a young Emeril Lagasse, she and Bienvenu again sat down to talk through the possibilities. When Lagasse went out on his own, Bienvenu joined him and helped to manage the creation of his brand and cookbooks.
“Marcelle Bienvenu is one of the most knowledgeable people when it comes to Louisiana cooking,” Lagasse said. “She is a gracious and humble woman whose passion for the cuisine runs deep.”
For years, she was a food columnist for The Times-Picayune.
Bienvenu also worked with Chef John Folse for 11 years teaching culinary classes at Nicholls State University.
“She certainly has always been right there being the most beautiful, elegant thing in the room,” said Poppy Tooker host of “Louisiana Eats!,” the NPR-affiliated radio show and podcast. “She’s just such a special and wonderful person, and I think that comes from her life, partially her life in food from her earliest days right through her entire career.“
Last year, Bienvenu rereleased “Who’s Your Mama, Are You Catholic, and Can You Make A Roux: A Cajun/Creole Family Album Cookbook” in a new bold and beautiful, updated style. Lagasse wrote the foreword for the giant 398-page bright pink collection of recipes and photographs.
In reflecting on her life and legacy and how she built so many relationships, Bienvenu says she learned a lot from her father, who was a newspaperman
CURIOUS
Continued from page 1G
transport ships in the effort to cut American oil supply lines through the Gulf of Mexico,” Eli Haddow wrote in the July 2021 edition of The Historic New Orleans Collection’s “First Draft” blog “In about a year’s time, more than 56 vessels were destroyed by the German Kriegsmarine, according to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.”
Haddow was a marketing associate for the collection when he wrote the piece, which was inspired by a framed draftsman’s map. He’s no longer with the museum but now works for the Peter Mayer Agency in New Orleans
“But I was doing a lot of social media then. I would spend time walking around the galleries, and I always found this map fascinating,” he said.
An intriguing map
The map was created by draftsman Carl D. Vought, who documented how the U-boat fleet of 20plus crisscrossed the Gulf, easily picking off targets.
“The marks on the map represent sunken or damaged ships whose names are listed on the right side,” Haddow said. The section of the map nearest the mouth of the Mississippi, marked ‘DA90,’ was particularly dangerous.”
It’s in this section, about 45 miles off the Louisiana coast at Houma, where Vought’s map shows the U-166’s proposed location.
Why did it sink?
So, how did the submarine find its way to the Gulf’s floor? Well, U-166 became a bit ambitious and torpedoed the civilian passenger ship Robert E. Lee on June 30, 1942. The ship’s escort, U.S Navy boat PC-566, immediately retaliated by dropping depth charges on the sub.
Crawfish Stew-Fay
Recipe by Marcelle Bienvenu. Makes four to six servings.
¼ pound (1 stick) unsalted butter
2 cups chopped yellow onions
1 cup chopped green bell peppers ½ cup chopped celery
2 pounds peeled crawfish tails
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour, dissolved in
½ cup water Salt and cayenne
2 tablespoons chopped green onions
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley leaves Cooked long-grain rice
1. Heat the butter over medium heat in a large, heavy pot. Add the onions, bell peppers and celery Cook, stirring, until soft and lightly golden about 10 to 12 minutes.
2. Add the crawfish and cook, stirring occasionally until they begin to “throw off a little liquid” — about five minutes.
3 Add the water/flour slurry (Bienvenu puts hers in a small, lidded jar and shakes it up to mix it well). Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally, until the mixture thickens — about three to four minutes.
4. Season with salt and cayenne.
5. Remove from heat Add the green onions and parsley
6. Serve in bowls over rice.
“I guess everybody always said I was like Daddy He was a big raconteur He never met a stranger He was always happy,” she said. “He was of the opinion that you never let the truth get in the way of a good story It was wonderful. I think that has been me. I like stories. I like to know about people, how they feel, what they do.”
“ but the small oil slick that appeared suggested that the crew had only damaged the U-boat, not destroyed it,” Haddock wrote.
“According to the Navy Times, the boat’s captain, Lt. Cmdr Herbert Claudius, was sent to antisubmarine school to improve his tactics. A couple of weeks later, a Coast Guard plane off the coast of Houma spotted a sub and dropped its own depth charge. A larger oil slick appeared — U-166 had been sunk.”
Meanwhile, most of the Robert E. Lee’s crew of 131, six merchant marine officers and 270 passengers, escaped by lifeboats or rafts.
Attacks by the German fleet peaked in the summer of 1942. It wasn’t until later that year, when merchant ships traveled with military escorts, that the killing abated.
“However until then, many vessels were doomed,” Haddock wrote. “Illuminated coastlines silhouetted ships, making them easy to see in the night. Slow and unarmed vessels became easy prey for the nimble U-boats.”
Mandated blackouts
The government remedied this by mandating blackouts along the coast, meaning homes and businesses were required to turn off all lights at night, thereby hampering the Nazi fleet’s night vision
Haddow was aided in his research by Historic New Orleans
Collection Chief Curator Jason Wiese, who located World War II posters designed by Federal Arts
Project artists during this time.
The posters were community service pieces created by the Works Progress Administration War Services for the Office of Civilian Defense in New Orleans, reminding American citizens to adhere to the blackouts and keep all information about the Port of New Orleans’ ship schedules confidential.
It’s interesting to note here that
She claims her father’s take on life of never letting the truth get in the way of a good story as her motto.
“I told that to the priest the other day,” she said. “And he said, ‘Now, Marcelle, I’m not sure about that.’”
‘Good ice’ and cheap crawfish
These days, Bienvenu spends most of her time in her St. Martinville home with her husband, friends and family She is a fan of saying “yes” to invitations to get out and about.
of corn
is
and
At 80, Bienvenu is as svelte and stylish as a Paris runway model — with twice the grace and just a touch of fuss, which only adds to her charm.
After all, she’s famously particular about her ice, often bringing her own to events and restaurants.
She likes, as she describes it, “good ice.”
“The ice in home refrigerators, they’re white, right?” she asked. “It’s nasty They smell bad.”
For the record, “good ice” is clear and “tastes like water,” Bienvenu explains. “And if you don’t have good ice, you cannot have a good cocktail.”
In the guest house kitchen — just next door to the home she has shared with her husband, architect Rock Lasserre, for decades — Bienvenu prepares her mother’s crawfish étouffée.
Lasserre designed the kitchen in the guest house. It’s picture perfect, but there’s one thing she wishes they had done differently The propane burners are situated at the end of the island, taking up its full width, leaving no room to rest a spoon or prep ingredients nearby
A little design flaw like that doesn’t faze
PROVIDED PHOTO BY THE HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS
lluminated coastlines made it easy for German captains to pick targets in the Gulf of Mexico. This WPA War Services poster urges citizens to black out their lights. This poster is part of The Historic New Orleans Collection’s Anna Wynne Watt and Michael D. Wynne Jr Collection.
one such poster was created by noted WPA artist John McCrady of New Orleans, known for his public murals, French Quarter art school and such paintings as “The Shooting of Huey Long.”
Along with the posters, Wiese also unearthed a letter from the Office of Civil Defense dressing down New Orleans’ Antoine’s Restaurant for failing to turn off a light in one of its rooms.
Wasn’t the first time
However, the summer of 1942 wasn’t the first time Louisiana’s coast was under threat by a German Navy
“What’s also interesting is there are photos taken in 1919 or 1920 after World War I, when a German U-boat was captured,” Haddox said. “They sailed it up the Mississippi River and kind of showed it off in New Orleans.”
Bienvenu. She’s been making her mama’s crawfish étouffée so long, she could do it with her eyes closed.
She believes she knows the origin of crawfish étouffée. “As far as I’m concerned, it started in Breaux Bridge,” Bienvenu said. “There was a little cafe on Main Street across from the church in Breaux Bridge. I think it was called Thelma’s, and she would have that every Friday Back before they started the Crawfish Festival, all the crawfish came from the basin.”
She remembers her father saying, “We’re so poor we’re going to have to have crawfish Friday because they were like 15 cents a pound.”
Bakelite jewelry and beyond
Bienvenu says she doesn’t spend much time thinking about what kind of legacy she’ll leave — though she does want her nieces and nephews to appreciate her Bakelite jewelry collection. (One of her nephews is Gov Jeff Landry, by the way — her sister’s son.)
“I said they’ll probably throw that away, so I better label it,” she said. “They’ll just think it’s plastic.”
So, she did what she does well: She documented it. She made a little booklet about the pieces and their history, just like she once did with her mama’s recipes, and the flavors and stories of Cajun Country In her own way, Bienvenu is responsible for far more than a collection of cookbooks. Her work has helped preserve a way of life — one meal, one story and one good-ice cocktail at a time.
Email Jan Risher at jan.risher@ theadvocate.com.
As for the U-166, there was vindication for Claudius, lieutenant commander of U.S. Navy boat PC-566.
Location was wrong
“Geologists scanning the Gulf floor in 2001 found the felled German submarine close by the wreckage of the Lee, far away from its assumed resting place off of Houma,” Haddox writes.
“The submarine hit by the Coast Guard plane, it was discovered, was damaged but managed to escape. The US Navy corrected the error in 2014 and gave Claudius and PC-566’s crew credit for sinking U-166 — 72 years after it happened.”
According to other historic accounts, this places the U-166 about 45 miles east of where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf.
Photos of wreckage
Finally, in 2014, The Associated Press published a story of marine geologist and geophysicist Robert Ballard’s exploration of the wreckage Remote photos taken from his vessel, Nautilus, show both U-166 and Robert E. Lee about a mile beneath the Gulf’s surface.
Ballard is best known for his photos of the Titanic’s wreckage in the North Atlantic Ocean. His crew videoed and mapped the Gulf vessels for a National Geographic documentary Ballard’s photos show that the U-boat itself was broken in two by the U.S. Navy ship’s depth charge. The article also points out that the submarine’s commander Oberleutnant zur See Hans-Günther Kuhlmann, and his crew of 51 died in the wreckage.
Do you have a question about something in Louisiana that’s got you curious? Email your question to curiouslouisiana@ theadvocate.com. Include your name, phone number and the city where you live.
RISHER
Continued from page 1G
the past can be difficult to find Last year a guy named Michael G got tired of looking for them and started making his own. He sent me postcards made of the end of a Kleenex box, the front of a cereal box and a piece of a campaign mailer I hope some people this year will follow in Michael G’s path and make postcards from unexpected paper and objects.
A. Kern sent a postcard from Paris, saying, “I am an old, retired French teacher returning to Paris for another visit.”
Carla from Germany wrote a year ago this week, on May 23, 2024: “Today the German Constitution, called Grundgesetz, has its 75th birthday.” She goes on to explain that the first sentence of the German Constitution is: “Human dignity is inviolable.” Just to be sure, I looked up “inviolable.” It means: never to be broken, infringed or dishonored. I like that.
Carla went on in her postcard: “Also, the (West) German state was founded today 75 years ago, thanks to USA, France and Great Britain after the horrible Nazi terror and World War II. I think our constitution can avoid another dictatorship and protect the democracy I think it is one of the best in the world.”
Reading back through last year’s postcards makes me both grateful and hopeful for the many people who took the time to send them last year and for the many we hope to receive this year Who knows where they will come from and what they will say?
To participate, send postcards to: Jan Risher,The
COLLECTION
A ‘slurry’
starch
water
added to Marcelle Bienvenu’s Crawfish Stew-Fay
STAFF PHOTOS BY BRAD BOWIE
Marcelle Bienvenu tends to her zinnias at her home in St. Martinville.
AT THE TABLE
Turn state’s official fruit into strawberry jam
BY DEBRA TAGHEHCHIAN Contributing writer
The pelican is the state bird of Louisiana, and the state flower is the magnolia But did you know that the state fruit is the strawberry?
Yes, that most common and muchloved fruit is our Louisiana state fruit. Strawberries grow in the eastern part of Louisiana in communities with names like Ponchatoula, Amite, Albany, Holden and Independence. Best known is Ponchatoula and its annual Strawberry Festival Festivalgoers feast on all things strawberry, from strawberry shortcakes to strawberry daiquiris.
We can thank the Italian and Hungarian immigrants who started the cultivation of strawberries in Louisiana in the 1800s. By the 1920s, the berry business was booming, with berries being put onto trains and shipped to other parts of the United States.
Springtime is the optimal time to have the freshest and tastiest of this fruit. It is also the time to preserve that goodness It is precisely when I take out my trusty old water bath canning pot and make some strawberry jam. Later in the summer, I will preserve figs and blackberries, but springtime is reserved for making strawberry jam
We take for granted in this modern world that we can always find all the fruits and vegetables that we want In previous times, canning and preserving was the only way to have fruits in the offseason. Now, people can find them pretty much year-round. But one fact remains: to get really tasty strawberries, it’s important to buy them in season. Although strawberry season in Louisiana has ended, look for fresh berries from other regions at the supermarket. Like most of my recipes, I use few ingredients in this jam just three, in fact. Strawberries, sugar and pectin is all that’s needed.
There may be some initial investment if someone has never canned before and needs to buy jars and a hot water bath canning pot, but with this equipment comes years of canning as the canning jars can be reused. After canning and preserving the fruits’ goodness for the first time, the activity might bring
some experimentation with other fruits and vegetables. With an ever-growing concern over what additives have been added to processed foods, making your own preserves will help control what you eat For first-time canners, be sure to read and follow careful directions about proper canning techniques. Remember, the idea is to preserve food that can be enjoyed year-round. Most of all, maintain the fruit color and flavor and avoid sickness due to poor canning practices.
Strawberry Jam
Makes 10 (8-ounce) Mason jars
51/2 cups of crushed strawberries (about 3 1-quart boxes of strawberries)
1 (1.75-ounce) box of fruit pectin
8 cups of sugar
1. Sort and wash the strawberries, removing any blemishes and stems and caps. Chop the berries and place in a large bowl. Using a potato masher mash the berries.
2. Following manufacturer’s directions, sterilize the canning jars and prepare the two-piece canning lids. Set aside and make the jam.
3. Place the crushed berries into a large 8-quart Dutch oven. Add the pectin and stir well.
4. Place on high heat and, stirring constantly, bring quickly to a full boil with bubbles over the entire surface.
5. Add sugar and continue stirring. Heat again to a full bubbling boil. Boil hard for 1 minute, stirring constantly
6. Remove from heat. Skim off foam that has collected on the surface of the jam.
7. Fill hot jam into hot, sterilized jars, leaving 1/4 inch space at top. Wipe rims of jars with a clean, dampened paper towel. Adjust the two-piece metal canning lids and fingertip tighten the metal lids.
8. Process the jam jars in a boiling water canner Be careful to follow the recommended directions and processing time depending on your elevation.
9. Remove jars from canner and place on a cooling rack. Allow the processed jars to remain undisturbed for 12 to 24 hours after the hot water bath canning process. Store in a cool, dry and dark place. Refrigerate jam after opening the sealed jar
PHOTO BY DEBRA TAGHEHCHIAN
Strawberry jam can be made by using just three ingredients. Although strawberry season in Louisiana has ended, look for fresh berries from other regions at the supermarket.
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