The Tabasco Company is know worldwide for its famous pepper sauce.
The company is still family-owned by the McIlhenny Company and operated on the same site.
Shortly after the Civil War, Edmund Mcilhenny grew a crop of capsicum peppers and developed the Tabasco sauce. His recipe is so unique that he was even granted a patent on it.
After watching a short film on the history of the Tabasco Company, we were able to watch the sauce being bottled behind glass walls. The plant produces 700,000 bottles of their sauces a day working 2 shifts, 24 hours per day, 4 days per week. That's 67,200,000 bottles a year! Wow! That's a lot of Tabasco!!
Also on display were some of the oak barrels in which mashed peppers are mashed and allowed to ferment for three years in white oak barrels from Jack Daniels. A thick layer of salt is placed on top of the barrels while the mashed peppers are fermenting to keep contaminates from getting in the peppers.
Tabasco now has a "Reserve" Sauce that ferments for 8 years! After the peppers have finished fermenting, the mash is mixed with a special vinegar and sitrred for a month. One of the big barrels with the mashing peppers was on display with a clear lid on top. You could smell the peppers through the holes in the lid.
After leaving the factory,
we walked over to the Tabasco Country Store where they had most of their products available to sample. They don't just make the red pepper sauce and green pepper sauce like is in the factor pictures above. They make all kind sauces, jellies, salsa, pickles, marinades, and even ice cream! We sampled it all (including the ice cream, of course). The "Reserve" sauce (that ferments for 8 years) was probably the hottest. My favorite was the sweet and spicy sauce and Chuck really liked the pickles so we bought one of each.
They also had some souvernir Tabasco clothing and hats. Ken and Chuck found some Tabasco doo-rags. Chuck had a little difficulty figuring out how to wear his doo-rag.
Ken and Chuck, our motorhome drivers and Easy Riders. :)
After we left the Tabasco store, we drove over to the Avery Island Jungle Gardens, but it was starting to rain so we decided to head on to Duffy's Diner, a restaurant recommended to us by one of the ladies at the Tabasco Store.
When we were driving out Avery Island Road, we noticed a couple of artists that were set up painting on the side of the road. Ken pulled over and Chuck got out and went over and talked to one of the artists. They were painting for a local festival that is occurring within the next few weeks. They were painting or drawing sketches of this old barn and sugar cane field:
As we drove out a little further, we went by this RV on stilts. I guess they wanted to make sure they did not get flooded out!
We drove over into Duffy's Diner and parked around back. There was somebody eating their lunch in their car and Chuck asked them how the food was. He told Chuck it was very good.
We asked the waitress and a couple of the local patrons what they recommended off the menu. Chuck decided on a catfish po-boy and seafood gumbo, Bonnie decided on a barbecue sausage po-boy...
and Ken and I both decided on the crawfish etouffee.
I think we all enjoyed our luppers. I tried the seafood gumbo but I wasn't very crazy about it because it was kind of earthy tasting. But the crawfish etouffee...DEEE-LI-CIOUS!!!
After stuffing ourselves on some real good Cajun cookin', we made one stop at Wal-mart before heading back to the campground. That evening, we got back together to play Skip-Bo and Pinochle with the women winning both of two very close games!
Tomorrow, we move on to San Antonio!
They also had some souvernir Tabasco clothing and hats. Ken and Chuck found some Tabasco doo-rags. Chuck had a little difficulty figuring out how to wear his doo-rag.
Ken and Chuck, our motorhome drivers and Easy Riders. :)
After we left the Tabasco store, we drove over to the Avery Island Jungle Gardens, but it was starting to rain so we decided to head on to Duffy's Diner, a restaurant recommended to us by one of the ladies at the Tabasco Store.
When we were driving out Avery Island Road, we noticed a couple of artists that were set up painting on the side of the road. Ken pulled over and Chuck got out and went over and talked to one of the artists. They were painting for a local festival that is occurring within the next few weeks. They were painting or drawing sketches of this old barn and sugar cane field:
As we drove out a little further, we went by this RV on stilts. I guess they wanted to make sure they did not get flooded out!
We drove over into Duffy's Diner and parked around back. There was somebody eating their lunch in their car and Chuck asked them how the food was. He told Chuck it was very good.
We asked the waitress and a couple of the local patrons what they recommended off the menu. Chuck decided on a catfish po-boy and seafood gumbo, Bonnie decided on a barbecue sausage po-boy...
and Ken and I both decided on the crawfish etouffee.
I think we all enjoyed our luppers. I tried the seafood gumbo but I wasn't very crazy about it because it was kind of earthy tasting. But the crawfish etouffee...DEEE-LI-CIOUS!!!
After stuffing ourselves on some real good Cajun cookin', we made one stop at Wal-mart before heading back to the campground. That evening, we got back together to play Skip-Bo and Pinochle with the women winning both of two very close games!
Tomorrow, we move on to San Antonio!
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