We know there’s no comparison to Louisiana shrimp, right? So why can’t they get any respect?
This weekend in New Orleans, shrimp will indeed get it’s due, at a new festival designed to support local shrimpers and the Louisiana seafood heritage they represent, a festival where you can bring an ice chest to load up for home and where plenty of people will be dancing to the live music in their trusty shrimp boots.
But first, the problem: the prices for local shrimp at the dock are so poor that some fishing families can’t make it worthwhile to harvest them.
The main issue is the flood of cheap imported shrimp, which is manifestly inferior and shrouded with issues over food safety and labor concerns. Remember the radioactive shrimp recalls from markets this summer? That was not netted in Grand Isle.
But that imported shrimp doesn’t buy itself. At least part of the problem is treating seafood like an interchangeable commodity, rather than a delicious and valued, but vulnerable, resource for our food culture.
That’s what the Louisiana Shrimp Festival is out to do. It’s in league with a nonprofit called Shrimp Aid, and it all goes down Saturday and Sunday at the Broadside outdoor event venue, in the Mid-City neighborhood of New Orleans.
Restaurants and pop-ups will prepare shrimp, applying a range of different global traditions, from Creole to Colombian, there’s a shrimp peel-and-eat competition for furiously flying fingers over the boil, and even a giant shrimp puppet show on the main stage.
There will also be shrimpers themselves on hand, selling shrimp from their tailgates and talking with the community about their way of life and what they’re up against.
The suppliers of the best shrimp you’ll ever eat are right down the road in Louisiana, and they’re making the road trip to this festival to stand up for what we have but could lose if we take it all for granted.
It’s a serious issue, but the Louisiana Shrimp Festival is about bringing people out for a good time too.
That’s why they’re saying slap on the shrimp boots when you come out. You know you have them in the closet for rainy days or a muddy day at Jazz Fest. Here’s a chance to break them out in solidarity with our shrimpers.
