Calas: The Beignet’s Surprising (and Sweet) Predecessor

What up y’all?

I’m here in Jackson Square in the Heart of the French Quarter, right outside of Cafe Du Monde, known for their fried beignets and powdered sugar, something I grew up on.

Then we are going to talk about the calas, another fried fritter no-one knows about, but it is synonymous with New Orleans.

This is Good Gumbo.

Beignets are pillowy fried dough squares, smothered in powdered sugar and eaten hot with: New Orleans’ famous café au lait.

Beignets are tasty - but they have a lesser known cousin with an interesting history... Calas --- made with an even more famous Louisiana ingredient – rice...

This is Miss Barbara.

We are standing out here on beautiful Esplanade lined with these old oak trees, right outside of Le Musee... Free People of Color.

That’s right... “Les Gens du Colour Libre” And we are going to talk about calas.

Belle calas, Tout chaud calas.

The history of New Orleans’ “free people of color” has an interesting connection to the calas.

In the early 1800s, Louisiana’s Free People of Color made up 1/5th of the city‘s population.

These were people of African descent who were born free, set free, or purchased their own freedom.

Louisiana’s slavery laws during colonial times, gave slaves the right to own property, and purchase their own freedom and work for money.

Many slaves did this as street vendors, selling coffee and calas.

Women sold these calas on the street, street vendors.

Yes, they were street vendors, merchants, like the Praline Lady, the Peanut Man, Rose Nicaud with her coffee.

And every vendor had a song to bring people out to purchase their goods.

You would say something like, “tout chaud calas!

Tout chaud calas, Madame!” Come get your calas!

I’ll buy all you got.

Calas are the history, the old history of New Orleans.

Why don’t you tell me about that?

We had them for religious purposes when we made our first communion, which we call Little Communion.

Little Communion.

Little Communion in the Roman Catholic Church.

And we also had them on Mardi Gras morning.

So we knew when the Indians were coming out, the black Mardi Gras Indians, because it was time to eat calas for breakfast.

The calas is made with rice.

Rice.

And we eat everything with rice here.

Of course, rice did not grow here, but... And so, we can trace that rice all the way back to Africa.

To Africa, definitely.

When I grew up down here in New Orleans, we used to eat calas.

My mom used to make it in the morning.

Yeah, it’s morning.

But that tradition has kind of subsided a little bit.

A lot of people do not cook it.

They don’t know how to cook it.

So you have another generation, two generations, that know nothing about a calas.

Calas is very important to my house.

It is very important to maintaining the culture.

Yeah, the history Yeah The culture... the family dynamic... the old food ways... Yeah.

We got to save the calas.

Oh Yeah You and I need to get together and go cook some calas at Galatoire’s.

I’d like that.

Miss B!

Miss Barbara, how are you doing today?

I am doing good, cher!

Welcome to the kitchen at Galatoire’s.

Well, I’m glad to be here.

So today, we’re going to make your famous calas.

Great, great!

Belle calas!

Yeah, there’s a secret to the madness and it has to do with the rice.

It has to do with the rice, yes, I always use extra-long grain rice and the rice has to be extremely cold and it has to be a day old, so, in the refrigerator, and you keep it in the refrigerator until you’re ready to use it.

OK, and all the simple ingredients, right?

So you have rice, flour, sugar, salt, vanilla, baking powder.

Nutmeg, and eggs.

We mix the rice up and then we’re going to start adding.

What goes in first?

I need 2 cups of the dried rice.

Two cups of this?

I’ll tell you what two cups is.

Right here, that’s one cup right there.

That’s two cups.

You sure?

I’m positive.

I’ll put a little extra to be on the safe side.

Put a little lagniappe.

Mom always said put a little extra to be on the safe side.

Put a little extra.

Ok let’s, then you need flour.

OK, this is your flour right here.

The heaping teaspoons of the sugar.

OK. And the baking powder and my nutmeg.

Uh huh.

Throw all this together.

This is your nutmeg.

Oh, OK. You can go with the vanilla.

You can’t go wrong with vanilla.

So, we need the flour and the eggs.

So, here’s the trick about eggs.

You want to tap them on a flat surface.

That’s what I say.

Everybody tends to do this.

I think you need to do that because, you never know when you’re going to get a rotten egg (laughs).

We don’t want no rotten eggs.

So, we have all of the flour and everything in here, Yes ma’am.

So you have to mix it in.

It seems very simple.

It is very, very simple, but if you don’t follow the right chain of action, it’ll just fall apart on you.

So, this is technically a beignet.

Well, no, because it has a filling in it.

So, it’s a fritter.

A beignet is dried and it’s empty on the inside It’s like a levened dough.

I need a little more rice.

Need a little more rice.

Maybe I’ll use my small hands today.

So now we’re ready to put it in.

Yeah, it’s bubbling nice, huh?

It’s going to come up by itself, brown.

That looks at that.

That’s looks good.

Tout chaud, belle calas!

C’est bon!

And then it starts browning and when it’s browning, you’re gonna put it on the paper towels.

My grandmother used to use a brown paper bag.

Do you, you want to brown both sides, right?

Both sides are brown and it’s important to have a spoon with the slots in it like that, so the grease can fall off.

It’s a good idea if you wanna use peanut oil.

Peanut oil is just as good.

See how quick they frying?

They’re frying very fast.

This is perfect right here..

Here, that color, they fry fast, they bubble up because of the leveling we add with the baking powder.

Just cool slightly And then you powder them with the sugar.

You are doing good.

You’re doing great, Chef!

This is my first time.

It’s my first day.

You’ll be a calas man.

It’s my first day.

How’my doing?

You’re doing wonderful!

Ooh, Miss Barbara, these things are cooling down a little bit.

I think so.

So, we need to powder them with a little sugar.

You said, you said, generous.

Generously!

Just go all around.

‘Cause, there’s nothing down here in New Orleans that is not generous, I can tell you, between the revelry and the parties.

I mean, you ain’t gonna see these calas, no more.

H, it;’s good.

I think they’re ready.

That’s good, that’s enough.

Let’s taste one.

You taste one and I’ll taste one.

So, this goes back generations and generations.

To the 1800s.

Tout chaud calas.

It’s good.

It is a good thing we were doing.

Here in New Orleans, we’re keeping up the cultural memory of the food and nothing should ever be changed about the calas.

Yeah.

A lot of our food has been turned over into other kinds of things.

you don’t even recognize it.

But you can’t do this with food that’s here.

You have to preserve the history and the narrative.

I mean, because if it’s that good, why change it?

Right, it goes with people in the stories, the history, everything and the flavor.

You wouldn’t wanna sausage calas.

No, I wouldn’t to tell you the truth.

Miss Barbara, this has been fun.

This has been real fun.

We got to cook in the kitchen again soon Yes, we do.

OK?

OK. Craving more?

Check out PBS and Eater’s new season of “No Passport Required.” John Chef Marcus Sammuelsson on a journey across the U.S. to celebrate the incredible immigration traditions and cuisine woven into American food and culture.

Tune in or stream the show on the PBS video app.

Head to the link in the description below for more.