A Y NOT Cajun Vittles
1217 Park Avenue
Breaux Bridge, Louisiana 70517
February 13, 2018
Sometimes the answer to "Hey, Why Not?" is to create a quirky way-off-the-beaten-path destination that ought to have comfort food lovers beating a path to find.
The food landscape is filled with entrepreneurs, risk takers and dreamers. Tonya Marsocci is all three.
If I hadn’t left La Poussiere in the late afternoon daylight after dancing to a great zydeco band, I would never have seen the quirky hand painted sign hanging on a white picket fence right across the street. The bold red letters A Y NOT Cajun Vittles certainly gets points for folksy originality.
No sign of a restaurant. Halfway down an aging cement driveway, I see a small cedar framed shack, apparently closed, that leads to another street parallel to where I started. I walk up three steps to an aluminum framed ordering window covered with the names and prices of offerings. Still no sign of life. A smooth metallic swoosh later, I’m startled when the window slides open and I’m greeted cheerfully by a woman whose blonde ringlets fall casually from under her white Nike visor.
Forty-five minutes later, I’ve devoured a Triple X Cajun Dog, listened to the story of a woman who is living her dream, and doing everything possible to give it a happy ending.
Connecting via geography and family seem like the first things people ask in order to get acquainted in these parts so I’m not surprised when she asks, ”Where you from?”
“Boston” says I.
“What’s your name?”
“Paul Tamburello”
“That’s a good ‘ol paisan name!” she says with a raspy laugh right from her gut. “I was married to an Italian from Boston.”
Fewer than six degrees of separation later, we’re connected and practice reciting our last names by squeezing out every vowel. It helps that I can pronounce Marsocci the way they do it in the old country.
Tonya is one big bundle of bubbling energy. “I want you to try my Triple X Cajun Dog and brag on it when you get back to Boston,” she says. She means it. Tonya is as hungry for acknowledgement as I am for dinner.
Tonya’s been tinkering with the menu and drumming up business since she opened last August.
“Everybody does hamburgers. I want to have a Cajun specialty.” I hear her words but I feel the unspoken conviction that’s saying, ‘I want to be different, to become a household name, a destination for local families and people who live within driving to roll down my driveway, stop at the drive-up window and order food every day. And brag about it’.
She tried selling a hot dog with crawfish topping but learned customers didn’t go for the combination. Keeping a price point when filling the bun with crawfish wouldn’t work since crawfish prices swing wildly during the year. The same creative juices that thought up A Y NOT Cajun Vittles name for her business - a clever play on her first name - invented her signature “Triple X Cajun Dog,” fried catfish, melted cheese topped with crawfish etoufée.
Swoosh, the window slides opens again. Tonya hands me a hot packet wrapped in heavy aluminum foil. And waits.
“I think you’re going to enjoy that, it’s a big piece of Louisiana right there."
I take a bite. The cheese and liquid from the etoufée have been absorbed into the fresh bun. I taste the catfish and feel its fried texture then the cheese and savory crawfish flavors and a sly kick of piquant sauce. A mouthful of southwestern Louisiana indeed. "Everyone who orders it says it makes their taste buds dance," she says with that throaty laugh. I'm no exception.
When you’re struggling to make it in a tough business, it’s not every day that a customer from a big city a thousand miles away literally stumbles onto your tiny drive up shack then gushes about the food you put your heart and soul into. One compliment like this throws dry kindling into the will to succeed that burns within her.
This isn’t her first rodeo. Her family operated a business in Lafayette in the 80s that could routinely sell out 40 gallons of her mother’s gumbo every day during the Festival International. She's all done with sit-down service, lots of overhead, and managing employees.
It’s Ash Wednesday tomorrow, Lent begins. “I want to specialize in Cajun food for people on the go. I’ll be making crawfish etoufée and shrimp stew on Friday since no one eats meat. I’m thinking about opening up a food truck, bring food to the people instead of waiting for them to come to me, gives me more than one option.” Gotta love this woman’s gumption.
“I’m 54 years old and its time for me to do my own thing instead of make money for everyone else,” Tonya says, a Triple X dream wrapped up in a battle plan.
Tonya’s a fussbudget when it comes to food. She cuts her own French fries, hand forms every hamburger from beef she buys from the same butcher (“I don’t buy from the supermarket”), makes her own natcho sauces, does everything but milk the cows for the ice cream.
Then she tells me she designed her drive-up shack and helped put on the roof! The layout inside is clearly designed by someone who knows how to set up a workflow that can be operated smoothly by one or two people. It is positively spotless. Tonya has something to do with that too. ("If I go out to eat and the bathroom isn't clean, I walk right out the door.")
A Y NOT Cajun Vittles is a gem with tasty well-prepared food and ridiculously inexpensive prices. The cost for lunch for everybody in the family van competes with any fast food outlet and is way healthier. I paid $6.78 for my Triple X Cajun dog and a cup of really good vanilla ice cream.
If success is predicated on location, Tonya (now Tonya Berry) is facing headwinds. Although her property is zoned commercial, there are no other destination businesses along the street. The dance hall attracts a night crowd and she’s open Monday - Friday from 11 AM to 5 PM. She advertises on Facebook and leaves flyers where she can. In person, she’s a positive force of nature, energetic, enthusiastic, edging toward charismatic.
Business is slow. "Some days it gets you down. I advertise and get word of mouth business and people who come here tend to come back. I don’t want to throw the towel, I want to strive to make it better," she says in a rare moment of doubt. A moment later, the entrepreneur, risk-taker and dreamer perks up.
“My mom said you can’t call it a Triple X Cajun Dog, that sounds crazy. I sure can, I told her, it’s my business!”
That pretty much sums up what Tonya is all about. If pride and quality had a price point, no one could afford to eat here.

When I walk out the door of La Poussiere Dance Hall, it's hard to see the drive-up shack at the end of the driveway. No way you're not gonna notice those folksy signs!

"I designed everything here, the signs, the building, even this mailbox!" Tonya says with no small sense of pride.

The side entrance to her business? By now, I'm not surprised that Tonya designed that too. It's another piece of her business she says I can brag about.

The La Poussiere Dance Hall (red building) is across the street from the drive-in entrance (in my case, the walk -in entrance). If A Y NOT Cajun Vittles isn't your destination, you might drive right past the big sign tacked on the fence right in front of her house, the white house in the background.

Tonya's Triple X Cajun Dog. There are tons of interesting foods served around here but this one's an original.

"My grandfather built this house," Tonya says. "I bought it from my father." Her commute to her business is about thirty seconds.

Since the land is zoned for commercial, why not build my drive-up business right behind my house, Tonya thought. The entrance to her work kitchen is on left, a walk-up window on the corner, and the drive-up window to pick up food you ordered is at the opposite side of the shack.

The menu covers the basics: hot dogs, hamburgers, cheese sticks, ice cream, sweet potato fries, nachos, Bobbie's special praline cookies and a Louisiana sweet tooth favorite - Snow Cones. "Lots of snow cone places are seasonal. I'm open year round. Some days are hot, some cold, I've got the machine, if they want them, I've got them."

Open for business.

Stop at the drive-up window, pick up your food, continue to Park Avenue and be on your way.

La Poussiere Dance Hall in the background, Tonya's house between the dance hall and her drive-up business.

PT ready to brag about the food.

Tonya's son John, her mom Bobbie, Tonya on the steps of the entrance into the kitchen.

She hands me a tear-off sheet she distributes everywhere she goes. "You're gonna take that flyer back to Boston and brag on me, right?" Tonya says. Here's the answer!

Late breaking development...this will soon become A Y NOT on wheels!
Grums: Family Restaurant With Deep Roots in Westport MA
There are many reasons to head to Westport MA this summer: thousands head to the sandy stretches of Horseneck State Beach, some aim for high end restaurants like The Back Eddy, some for the laid back eateries on Main Road - Ten Cousins, Marguerite's, Village Pizza, and The Bittersweet Restaurant. Many of the locals and perennial summer residents head for Grums. It's sort of like walking in the back door of a friend's house and finding yourself in the kitchen. The practical menu is loaded with reasonably priced comfort food made from scratch from as many local sources as the owner can find.
Grums Family Restaurant
On today’s list of specials (there’s a hand printed list every day) – my choice is chowder and cakes. The clam chowder is New England style in a light milky broth, loaded with plenty of cubed potatoes and chunks of clams from local clam beds. The three deep fried golden clam cakes are breaded and filled with enough bits of clam to give authority to the trio.
Among the seven working at Grums today, there’s Kim, her daughters Kelsey 17, Katelyn 19, and her mother Joan. “Mom bakes pies, runs errands, preps food - she does whatever needs to be done at the moment,” Kim says.
140 Charlotte White Road Extension
Westport, MA
Open 7 days: Mon –Wed 6 AM-2 PM, Thurs-Sun 6AM-8PM
508-636-0550
Friday July 6, 2012
12:30 PM
It’s no wonder that Grums Family Restaurant has a homey feel to it. Most of the family works here. Named after the grand matriarch of Kim Jagmin’s family, three generations are here during my visit for lunch. So are a local cop, a farmer, several retirees, and a family of three.
Just about everything that comes out of the kitchen is made here from scratch, no cans or commercially prepared jars of the tartar sauce that arrives with my clam cakes. “The chicken soup is my grandmother’s recipe and the brown bread we serve is from a recipe I learned growing up in Westport,” Kim says.
After working for 17 and a half years at The Kozy Nook, a popular restaurant on Route 6 in Westport, Kim got the itch to own her own place. “I’ve always wanted to run a family restaurant but early on I wanted to spend time with my kids. Now that they’re older, I do because my two daughters work with me right here.”
“My mother used to work with Kim at the Kozy Nook,” says Stephanie, another young waitress. Kim’s dad may not be there physically but runs errands and helps from afar. This pretty much defines the idea of a family restaurant.
Photo: back row Kim, Joan, Betsy, Angela, Katelyn; front row Stephanie, Kelsey
“Grums” was the closest Kim’s brother could come to pronouncing “Grandma” when he was a toddler and the name stuck. Her photo is prominently displayed on the wall. From her fixed gaze, it appears not much got past her and is probably the only inspiration Kim needs to be sure everything is done just so.
“We make a point of being an affordable restaurant. I work with what my customers want as much as I can. I had some customers who wanted Rhode Island Style Jonny Cakes so I went to Gray's Grist Mill on Adamsville Road in Westport, bought their stone milled flour and now we serve them.”
“I actually see my family more now than I did before I opened. We all have busy lives, but my aunts and uncles and cousins come here to eat every two weeks or so. My aunt will be here Sunday morning,” Kim says.
“We are one big team,” Kim says. If you’ve been here more than once, Katelyn or Kelsey will recognize you and welcome you back. And every so often, Kim wipes her brow, pushes out the swinging door and heads from the kitchen to the serving area to chat up her customers.
“They’re friendly but don’t overdo it,” longtime Westport resident Paul Maurice says, “they make sure you’re happy with your meal and let you eat it in peace.” Mr. Maurice knew Kim Jagmin from the Kozy Nook. When he heard she was taking a stab at running her own place, he became a regular. “It saves me 20 miles round trip and the food is excellent.”
This is not a job for the faint of heart, no matter how many family members pitch in to help. Grums is open 7 days a week, 365 days a year, except for five major holidays. Even when you’re chasing your dream, it’s a labor of love.
Westport needs an eatery like this. A restaurant has been here on Charlotte White Road for generations. Spooners was here for ages then within a succession of several years Virginia’s, TJs, Erica’s - and now Grums. That young family of three can eat here without breaking the bank. And if they’re like me, they’ll be back soon.
Grum’s first anniversary will be August 16, 2012. If family togetherness has anything to do with longevity and success, maybe this time is the charm.
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
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Kim Jagmin makes a "Specials" menu every day. "It depends on what I have in the kitchen and what I find at the markets," she says.
Sketches of daughters Katelyn and Kelsey; Kim and Kelsey behind the counter.
The restaurant is small enough to retain a friendly, family vibe. "One of the things I like best is when customers start talking to each other between tables whether they know each other or have come in for the first time," Katelyn says.
July 11, 2012 in Commentaries, Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0)