Driving Ms Daisy: Hot Sauce and Travel

After leaving Lake Charles Louisiana I traveled to south to Avery Island. This is the home of Mcilhenny Tabasco manufacturing plant. They have free tours and explain how they make their famous sauce. I saw the plants and how the save the seeds and plant in greenhouses in January. They then transfer to the soil in April and harvest in August when the pepper is just the right shade of RED. All of the seeds come from the Island but most are shipped to South America and Africa for planting. After peppers are harvested they are mashed and salt added they are packed in oak barrels and aged for three years before being processed. They get the barrels from Jack Daniels in Tennessee and can reuse them until they are to broken to repair. After adding vinegar the mash is strained and bottled. You can look through a glass wall and watch the process.
High way 90 from I 10 in Lafayette La to Avery Island is very rough and it shook Daisy pretty good. She kept groaning and moaning all the way, I just put in my ear plugs and drove on along the bumpy road. After leaving the Tabasco plant I took 90 all the way to New Orleans about 139 miles. I will say the road conditions did improve as I traveled east to my destination. From New Orleans I continued to the last travel stop and spent a few hours sleeping. The road noise was disturbing and I woke several times and finally decided to continue on the journey about 3:30 this morning. I had planned to stay in the state park in Gulf Shores, Al but no sites were available so I found a RV resort just north of Gulf Shores and will spend the night here.
By the way if my friend Dan Swango and Son-in-Law Craig Musolf were here they would have enjoyed the samples at Tabasco land. I sampled several of the many hot sauces with the pretzel sticks provided. I also had a small sample of Raspberry Chipolte Ice Cream and also some Jalapeno Ice Cream.
For lunch I had Crawfish etouffee served over rice. I must say this was very rich and delicious. Pictures to follow