Meat Pies and Mac & Cheezza
If I might invoke the cliche, “It’s not just the destination, it’s the journey,” that’s how I try to live life - especially when it comes to road trip eats. On this recent trip to Louisiana we had two destinations,
Lafayette and Lake
Charles, and the edible treats we experienced in both places were incredible. Not to mention, we spent time with several lifelong friends, cousins, and a literal bus full of new friends. Because that’s what food does: it brings people together.
I hated to leave, if you really want to know. I love home, and I missed my kids, but I was loving life on the bayou. Okay, I was loving lunch on the bayou. And dinner, and breakfast. There was so much more to see. There was so much more to eat. But reality is what it is, and I have to work my day job to pay for these trips, so a return trip was inevitable. However, just because we had to leave, didn’t mean we had to retrace the same route we followed on the way down. There are other parts of Louisiana where people eat, and eat well.
My goal was to find my way to a meat pie where meat pies are most famous: Natchitoches. I told Cousin Mike of our plans, and he promptly went to his freezer and pulled out two frozen pies one “meat” and one crawfish. Not exactly road food, but remember: I had a cooler.
As we wound our way to Natchitoches we made a pit stop at a typical roadside convenience store/gas station. These days it’s hard to find one without some kind of hot food, and if they have hot food they most likely have pizza. If you know me at all, you know I place high value on pizza. And although there is definitely good pizza and better pizza, bad pizza is hard to come by if you’re hungry enough for it. I wasn’t particularly hungry, nor was I particularly full at this stop. Cousin Mike had provided some donuts and coffee before we left, but we were still a little drive from the meat pie capital of the world. And how could anyone possibly forgo an opportunity to eat a piece of Mac and Cheese pizza?
Some of you are thinking, “I can give you a lot of reasons to forgo a Mac and Cheese pizza, Mr. Smarty-Pants-WhoWill-Eat-Anything. It’s your job to eat it and tell me about it. I’ll stick with pepperoni and mozzarella (aka Pep and Cheese), thank you very much.” And I get that. Perhaps some of you don’t understand why I won’t eat coconut and do my best to avoid beets. We like what we like. But I did not forgo. I went for it.
The crust was normal gas station pizza crust - standard issue. The base, in lieu of marinara, was the mac and cheese itself, which bore a strong resemblance in both appearance and flavor to Velveeta Shells and Cheese. There was a layer of mozzarella covering that, and topping it all off was crumbled bacon. There, doesn’t that make everything all better? BACON! On future trips, should I find this again, I would probably forgo. It’s a beenthere-done-that kind of opportunity, like tongue tacos. I wouldn’t want a whole Mac and Cheese pizza, and I didn’t even eat this whole piece. But it certainly held me over till lunch. By the way, if you’re in that area and are itching to try it, the store was somewhere near Leesville, Louisiana - or according to my cellular telephonic device, we were in District 8. That made me think we had landed on the set of The Hunger Games, which, in a way, was true.
The next destination on our journey was Lasyone’s Meat Pie Kitchen. If you ask Miss Siri or Mr. Google about the best meat pie in Natchitoches, this will be near the top of the list. I also asked Cousin Mike, and he echoed their sentiments. The Lasyones have been doing this for about 50 years, and they’ve got it figured out by now. Of course, a little further reading will tell you that determining the best meat pie in Natchitoches is akin to determining the best barbecue in fill-inthe-blank county. Everybody’s got an opinion, everybody’s got a reason for it, and everybody’s right. Even the sign on the door of the Japanese/sushi place we passed by when walking downtown said, “We have meat pies!”
We ordered the meat pie platter with red beans and rice on the side (it was the vegetable of the day, and “when in
Rome…”). The pie was quite large, covering almost half the plate. It was fried crispy and golden brown, and full of the 80% beef, 20% pork meat mixture they are famous for. I really enjoyed it. As an appetizer we got an order of Louisiana Corn Fritters, which were essentially dense, almost cake-like hush puppies with bits of corn - deep fried of course. And honey to dip them in. This was no light meal by any means, but it was absolutely mission accomplished - check that off the bucket list. As a bonus, Natchitoches seemed like a neat place to explore, so a return trip may be in order, at which time I can try the Japanese meat pie - or at least someone else’s variety - and begin my own assessment of the best meat pie in town.
After all that heavy food, despite the remaining distance from Starkville, there is little left to tell. We snacked our way back to Mississippi and called ourselves blessed. Fattened and happy, with a journey to remember.