The Giant Omelette Celebration Sunday
Abbeville, Louisiana’s 5000 Egg Giant Omelette Celebration
Magdalen Square
November 7th, 2010
http://www.giantomelette.org/
Louisiana celebrates its history, agriculture, cuisine, music, and dance in all sorts of inventive ways. Pour a dash of each of these ingredients into a giant pan and voila, you have the two-day Giant Omelette Celebration in Abbeville.
The crowning act features a few dozen chevaliers (chefs) in toque hats who prepare and cook an omelette then serve it up to a throng that’s patiently watched the whole process carried out with the precision and grace of a culinary ballet.
Big things are involved. A 12-foot diameter stainless steel pan. 5026 eggs. 8-foot long wooden stirring paddles. And a list of ingredients the proportions of which defy comprehension of any sane chef.
What’s behind all the pageantry? Pride and heritage.
If you have doubts about the hugely French heritage around here, open a phone book in southwest Louisiana. Thousands of the names you find would still be in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick or Prince Edward Island if not for the British expulsion of the French Catholics for not pledging allegiance to the King of England.
They’d been a thorn in Britain’s side since the early 1700s, but when the French Acadians fought against the British in the French and Indian War between 1755 and 1763, Protestant England had enough. They expelled 10,000 Acadians from the Maritime provinces.
Over time, thousands of Acadians found a home in the territory of Louisiana. The territory was owed by Spain but friendly to the French Catholic migrants who settled in the Atchafalaya Basin and the prairies of southwest Louisiana and didn’t bother anybody.
The Acadiens' stubborn streak and grip on their French heritage survived. Travel down into bayou country and you’ll still hear French spoken with a Cajun (Acadian) accent thicker than gumbo roux.
The Giant Omelette Celebration has its roots in Bessieres, France.
The legend in Bessieres was that when Napoleon and his army swept through their town in the late 1700s, the local innkeeper served him an omelette. So enamored was Napoleon with its aromatic taste (remember, we’re talking south of France) that he ordered the villagers to gather every egg in town and prepare an omelette for his army the next day.
Since 1975 Bessieres has celebrated that occasion with an event in which they serve a 10,000-egg omelette to festive crowds.
In 1984, three members of the Abbeville Chamber of Commerce (Emery "Bichon" Toups, Tracy Kays, and Sheri Meaux) attended the Easter Omelette Festival in Bessieres, France. Sensing the bond of friendship and culture, the town of Bessieres responded by knighting the three ambassadors as Abbeville’s first chevaliers and invited Abbeville to join "The Confrerie". Sister cities that celebrate the Giant Omelette Festival: Frejus, France; Dumbea, New Caledonia; Granby, Quebec, Canada; Malmedy, Belgium; and Pigue, Argentina.
The Giant Omelette Festival was hatched. In 1984, Abbeville hosted its first Giant Omelette Festival by cooking and serving an omelette for 5000 people.
In the usual Louisiana fashion, the weekend event is loaded with music, dancing, food, and local arts and crafts vendors. Sunday afternoon, French heritage and culture is every bit as much an ingredient in the omelette as eggs themselves.
At 1:00 PM, after a 9:00 AM mass at St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church, Abbeville chevaliers are joined in friendship by representatives of the other Confreries in a "Procession of the Egg". Bearing wooden paddles, loaves of crusty French bread, and transporting 5026 snow-white eggs, the group marches around Magdalen Square and up to the stage set up at the top of Concord Street.
The population of Abbeville teeters on 12,000. By 1:00 PM, it appears that at least half of them are lining the street. Their eyes are fixed on a 12-foot diameter stainless steel skillet, a mound of sand on which logs are ablaze, and dozens of chevaliers in tall white toques.
At a stage set at the top of Concord Street, a Catholic priest offers benediction. A local woman sings the National Anthem. All the public speaking is first in French, with varying degrees of agility, then in English. Cecil Hebert, the Premier Grand Maitre who’s been in every one of the previous 25 celebrations, the mayor, and other dignitaries set the tone. The digital, fast paced world will have to take a back seat today to this little town’s tenacious grip on its tradition and heritage.
“The egg is the symbol of life and continuation of life,” Cecil Hebert says. “This year for the first time we’re involving the young in the celebration. We manufactured a smaller skillet and the young of the town, under guidance of the elder maitres, will make an omelette of their own as the elders make the giant omelette. We want our children to honor and understand their heritage and take it on when we are gone.”
“Chefs, begin cracking your eggs!”
A band plays traditional Cajun songs from the bandstand at the top of the street. Thousands of spectators are treated to the sight of men and women in white hats cracking eggs into enormous industrial sized aluminum pots. Mountains of eggshells are piled ceremoniously on giant tarps. Other chevaliers slice hunks of bread from scores of huge rounds of French bread. When the logs have burned to red-hot embers, the giant skillet is lowered and sits on its "legs" above the heat.
In a hilariously practical style, a chevalier operating an electric drill fitted with a three foot long mixing paddle whips up the hundreds of eggs in each pot. While the eggs are being prepared, another group of chevaliers swirls 52 pounds of butter around the giant skillet that’s been stationed atop the embers of the wood when they’re just the right temperature.
Each addition of an ingredient - listed below - into the giant skillet is announced to the ohhhs and ahhhs of the spectators. Chefs gracefully circle the skillet while stirring the ingredients with 8-foot long paddles. The whole spectacle has the feel of a royal ballet. A French-style line dance occasionally breaks out when red wine gets the better of several chefs as they wait their turn to stir.
Improbably, after an hour of stirring, the 12-foot diameter stainless steel skillet is removed from the fire by a forklift. A brigade of chevaliers dish a helping of omelette and a slice of crusty French bread onto a paper plate. Another brigade loads the plates onto trays and heads for the cheering spectators behind the barriers at the edge of the street. In a trice, the servings are plucked from the trays by grateful spectators. Thousands of servings later, the skillet is empty. So is smaller skillet in which the next generation has cooked their omelette.
The ingredient most on display today is one you can’t taste or smell. It is the feel of a small town finding a way to connect with its past. Their ancestors were expelled by the English from their first homes in the new world because they were stubborn, proud, and loyal to France, the country from which they had emigrated.
In spite of years of displacement, these hard working people found a new home here in Louisiana. They want to make sure their children remember and honor their roots. If it takes a giant omelette to make the point, bring on the eggs.
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
Photos of the rest of the celebration in the following posts.
The youngster with the spiffy beret will someday be wielding an omelette paddle.
Chevaliers have some fun as they organize for the "Procession of the Egg" around Magdalen Square and up Concord Street in the middle of Abbeville.
pt at large stirs up some fun.The 8-foot wooden paddle is one of several that will be used to stir the egg mixture in the 12-foot diameter skillet that is being heated up in the middle of Concord Street.
"The Procession of the Egg" begins around Magdalen Square at 1 PM.
Olga Toups, widow of Emery Toups, one of the three founders of Abbeville's Giant Omelette Festival, is the Queen of the celebration. Mr. Toups, a much beloved man, passed away November 3, a few days before the celebration.
Here come the chevaliers from Abbeville and representatives from six other countries in "The Confrerie."
The next generation of Abbeville chevaliers...
will prepare their own omelette under the supervision of their elders.
The TABASCO Kids - the gymmasts will add one of the final ingredients, what else, TABASCO® Sauce (made right here in Louisiana), as the giant omelette is almost done cooking.
More chevaliers...
and the priests who offered the 9:00 AM Mass earlier in the morning and who will offer a benediction before the Giant Omelette is prepared.
The expression "Don't carry all your eggs in one basket" has never made more sense.
Crusty French bread will be cut into hunks and served with a helping of omelette.
5026 eggs -one egg is added to the number since the first 5000 egg omelette celebration 26 years ago = will be loaded into these huge pots and mixed with a power drill!
By the time the festival reaches 5040 eggs, many of these Junior Confrerie members...
will be preparing the giant omelette...
and these little kids will be right in line to succeed them. The Abbeville Confrerie is making every effort to continue this tradition which celebrates the city's roots and French heritage.
"When residents join the organization, they take a pledge to pass the traditions along to their children, " Arlene White, Fourth Grand Maitre and publicity chairperson, tells me as she sees me scribbling notes and talking to another member of The Confrerie."There are about 100 members here in Abbeville."
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
I take two over light with home fries and wheat toast lightly buttered.
Posted by: Bill Pignato | November 29, 2010 at 09:53 PM
A brave man, indeed, Bill!
Posted by: Paul aka pt at large | November 29, 2010 at 09:55 PM