Lake Fausse Pointe State Park, St. Martinville, Louisiana
Acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent – – the LORD detests them both. ~ Proverbs 17:15
We drove to Avery Island today. You’re probably thinking we had some kind of wildlife or nature encounter there, but you’d be wrong. Avery Island isn’t even really an island. It’s a raised area with swamps and bayou surrounding it, and from the air, it looks like an island.
And it’s the home of the McIlhenny (pronounced MAC-ill-hany = like cane) Company Tabasco farm/processing plant.
Another very interesting place to visit!
But before we go there, let me tell you something about our drive. Remember when we were just in Alabama and I mentioned all the cotton along the sides of the roads? Well, around here, there’s sugar cane! We actually passed several trucks (which I was unable to get a picture of, aren’t you disappointed? 😊), and we even saw a woman along the side of the road, gleaning the fallen pieces.
Doesn’t look all that great, does it?
I tried in vain to learn something about the sugar cane business – like how they harvest, why the rows are elevated, what’s up with the burning in the fields – stuff you’d think would be available to the public. But all I could find were articles about how to grow the stuff in your own backyard, or the fact that they squeeze the juice out of the stalks to make sugar. Here’s a bit of information I was able to find, but since I don’t know when the article was written, I can’t tell you if the numbers mentioned are still accurate:
Sugar cane has been an integral part of the south Louisiana economy and culture for more than 200 years. When Jesuit priests first brought sugar cane into south Louisiana in 1751, little did they know that the foundation was being laid for an industry that now contributes $2 billion to the Louisiana economy, while also generating an overall economic value of $3 billion. Today, Louisiana sugar cane yields range from 30-50 tons per acre, with recoveries ranging from 180 to 240 pounds of sugar produced from each ton of cane.
It’s a sub-tropical and tropical crop that prefers lots of sun and lots of water – provided that its roots are not waterlogged (is that maybe why it’s planted in elevated rows?). In Louisiana it typically takes about six months to reach maturity (it may take as much as 24 months in other places around the world). Where it differs from many crops is that it re-grows from the roots so the plant lasts many cycles (or ‘ratoons’, a word derived from the Spanish ‘to sprout’) before it is worn out.
Sugar cane is harvested by chopping down the stems but leaving the roots so that it re-grows in time for the next crop. Harvest times tend to be during the dry season and the length of the harvest ranges from as little as 2 ½ months up to 11 months. The can is then taken to the factory.
The first stage of processing is the extraction of the cane juice. In many factories the cane is crushed in a series of large roller mills; similar to a wringer which was used to squeeze the water out of laundry in the past. The sweet juice comes gushing out and the cane fiber is carried away for use in the boilers, which unlike fossil fuels, is very environmentally friendly. The juice though is pretty dirty, containing soil from the fields, some small fibers and green extracts from the plant are all mixed in with the sugar. It’s cleaned up by using slaked lime (a relative of chalk) which settles out a lot of the dirt so that it can be sent back to the fields. Once this is done, the juice is thickened up into a syrup by boiling off the water using steam in a process known as evaporation. It is then sent on to the crystal-making step without any more cleaning.
The syrup is placed into a very large pan for boiling, the last stage. In the pan even more water is boiled off until conditions are right for sugar crystals to grow. The factory workers throw on some sugar dust to initiate crystal formation. Once the crystals have grown, the resulting mixture of crystals and mother liquor (Hey, I just type what they say. I have no idea why they call it that.) is spun in centrifuges to separate the two. The crystals are then given a final dry with hot air before being stored ready for dispatch.
Sugar cane is produced on more than 400,000 acres of land in 22 Louisiana parishes – with production of approximately 13 million tons of cane yearly. About 17,000 employees are involved in the production and processing of sugar cane in Louisiana – and the state boasts 11 raw sugar factories. Suffice to say that sugar cane production and processing is a major part of Louisiana’s economy and a treasured way of life for hundreds of farming families in our state.
Iberia Parish (where we’re staying), is home to Jeanerette, whose nickname is “Sugar City”. Sugar cane has been the key factor in the community’s economic growth for the past 200 years and two active sugar mills still operate in the area.
In recent years, misinformation about sugar has periodically appeared in the media across the U.S. The truth is that sugar is pure, contains no man-made chemicals or warning labels, is 100% natural and contains less than 16 calories per teaspoon. Unlike artificial sweeteners, sugar has been declared safe by the Food and Drug Administration. Sugar is a pure carbohydrate, which is an important nutrient that supplies energy to the body. In addition, sugar plays an important role in making other foods taste better and serves many vital functions in cooking and baking. The bottom line is that sugar is an essential part of a healthy diet for billions of people worldwide.
Once you’ve made the final turn, it’s a long straight road that leads you to Tabasco, and as we approached, there was a toll house that we assumed would be charging us an entry fee. Turned out to be a seemingly very elderly man who held out a card for us to put in our windshield. The card was held by a clothespin attached to a pole that he shoved out his little window at me as he mumbled for us to put it in the window. Not particularly welcoming. 😊
Fortunately, we didn’t have to pay anything. : )
I could smell the signature Tabasco scent as we drove up towards the parking lot, but once we were parked and got out of the Jeep, it vanished! Which seemed very strange to me. I say that in the first-person, because Blaine’s head’s been all stopped up these past few days. It’s not a cold; he’s allergic to something in the air around here, so he’s been mostly clogged in recent days.
Ohhhh . . . I get it now. . . . you can buy an empty barrel for your own personal use. . . .
like those chairs that were so popular in the 1960s!
They offer a self-guided tour here that costs $5.50/person, but we were given a senior discount. It’s for 55 and older, so we didn’t really feel old at all. 😊 Also, once we purchased our tickets (which was really a 2×4” red sticker with large black letters on it), she also handed us a bag full of tiny sample bottles! I’d say that more than covered the price of admission. Maybe that’s why they charge you – – so they don’t have to actually pay for their generosity. Hmmmm . . . . .
Did ya like the size-reference quarter I used? : )
They don’t give you a map, but they encourage you to follow the well-marked signs as you make your way into 5 different buildings:
1. The museum
Unfortunately, it was really difficult to photograph. I did the best I could.
2. The greenhouse
Too bad . . .
It was just a teaser trail. Very short, but enough so you could immerse yourself in the feel of the forest.
Not sure why they have it here.
3. The barrel museum and storage warehouse
We never fully undeerstood the reason for the salt on top of the barrel’s wooden lid. They said somewhere that it was to ‘keep out impurities’, but we couldn’t figure out how that works. We also never saw anything saying what happens to the salt when they open the barrels. Wonder if they can reuse it for something?
4. The blending warehouse
I had some informational pictures for here, but for some reason, they came out really blurry, so I’ll have to type it up for you:
BLENDING – – Here is where pepper mash – patiently aged in white oak barrels for up to three years – becomes finished TABASCO Sauce. A McIlhenny family member personally inspects and taste-tests each batch of pepper mash for flavor and heat. Once vinegar is stirred into the mash, the concoction is mixed intermitently for two to three weeks, then strained of skins and seeds before being sent to the factory floor for bottling. A firm believer in sustainability, McIlhenny Company grinds the leftover skins and seeds, and markets this fiery byproduct to other businesses for use in everything from candy to medicines.
I’m not sure who would buy such a large bag from a souvenir shop though.
5. The packaging plant
This is on the wall beside the door.
Made us think that maybe the workers receive lunch every day??
They were huge posters on the wall.
At the end of our tour, we ventured into the gift shop where Blaine spent a good amount of time picking out a t-shirt. The one he wanted was a cotton/polyester blend, which he can’t wear. And others were discarded for various reasons. He finally settled on this one.
Here’s the shirt Blaine settled on. 
And we ate a bunch of pretzels dipped in various flavors of sauce and other things like, believe it or not, honey. Real, non-spiced honey. They collect it from their very own bees! They use the bees to pollinate their pepper crops. Isn’t that great?!? It was really good honey, and I would’ve bought some, but I have a brand new bottle that’ll take me a while to use up. ☹
After spending 2 ½ hours on our self-guided tour (which the girl who sold us our tickets said would take about 45 minutes – – she doesn’t know us, does she? 😊), we decided to eat in their cafeteria, just to say we’d eaten there.
But wait! It’s also a picture of the outside of the restaurant!
Yeah. That’s it. It’s a picture of the restaurant.
The intention was to eat small and then get a good Cajun/Creole dinner somewhere on the way home, but it didn’t turn out that way. It’s good Blaine ordered his first. He decided on a chili dog. The girl got out a giant bun, and we thought it would swallow up his hot dog, but the next thing she did was put not one, but two full-sized hot dogs on it, along with about a ½ cup of their homemade thick chili (seasoned with Tabasco sauce, of course), half a jar of jalapenos, and some cheese! Plus, he got a ¼ cup of coleslaw! Well, that’ll hold him over until at least 7pm – – well beyond dinner time. So instead of ordering the cup of maque choux (means ‘mock shoe’ for some reason, and was originally a Native American dish that the Cajun’s refined), I went ahead and got a bowl. Of course, I chose the least nutritional thing on the menu – and lots of it. I’ve made maque choux before, as a side dish at one of our November Birthday Parties we used to host. It was the year I made all Louisiana-type food. But theirs was nothing like mine. Mine was loaded with corn, green and red peppers, celery and onions. What I ended up paying $8 for was not much more than creamed corn over rice. Oh, it had a few shrimp in it, but it was supposed to come with crawfish – which is why I ordered it in the first place. “We’re out of crawfish.” The girl told me when I received my meal and asked about the shrimp. Well, it would’ve been nice to know that beforehand, ya know? Oh. I got a cold dinner roll too. No butter, or anything, just a roll. What can I say? I chose poorly. At least it tasted good, and I jazzed it up a bit, because there were about a dozen bottles of Tabasco sauce on the table, too, and since we were there, we each used some. And we were stuffed when we were done. But we still shared the piece of cheesecake the girl in the store raved about. Had to ask for the chocolate-raspberry Tabasco sauce topping though, because the girl forgot to put it on top.
Isn’t it wonderful??
So my question to you is – – how many of you use Tabasco? They produce over 700,000 bottles of the stuff every single day, to 195 countries! (their map needs updated) Blaine uses it mostly on eggs, and I add a splash or two to Mexican food, but other than that? We don’t use it, and we’re not aware of people who do. So just who buys all this?
The only other thing we did today was walk up and down Historic Main Street in New Iberia.
Back when we first began dating, Blaine worked at a Gulf station. He was one of those old-fashioned station workers who pumped your gas, washed your windows and checked your oil! And he had a real cute uniform – an orange and white stripped long-sleeve t-shirt, and navy blue pants. : )
Yay me!
Guess these trees don’t sway in the breeze much!
The guy who built the house, made it’s bricks using his own brick kiln.
Guess I knew more about these homes than I thought.
James Lee Burke’s grandfather used to live here.
Who’s that, you ask?
He’s a big deal writer around these parts.
I’d never heard of him, but he’s written more books than I could count when I looked him up.
All of them set right here in the Bayou Teche region.
It was a nice walk, but for the most part, after all the historic buildings we’ve seen in our travels, the most exciting thing was the size of the Live Oaks. They continue to amaze us! Did you know that God has given us over 1,400 different types of trees just in the United States alone??? In the world, it soars to over 60,000!!! How wonderful our Creator, that He didn’t just stop at one or two!