PERSONAL INTERESTS

Photography: by Michael Terranova

     I really enjoy informing people about Gumbo File`. I explain what it is made from and who started this process. The Choctaw Indians were the first ones to do this. In the 1700 and 1800 the French and Spanish settlers came to Louisiana and they were shown the original way it was done. I am of true Louisiana Creole heritage. My fathers line was African, French and Mayan Indian from Guatemala. My mothers line was French, African, Spanish, German and Jamaican. This unique family learned to make Gumbo file` from the Native Indian and this has been handed down to me. I exhibit at Festivals, Workshops and Farmers Markets.

   With much pride in Lionel voice, he he talks about his Great Uncle, Joseph Willie Richard who originally founded Uncle Bill's Creole Filé, in 1904. Uncle Willie was born, blind, in 1894. As a young child he worked cutting sugarcane on the Alma Plantation in Lakeland, La. Waiting to marry until he could support a family, he developed his skills for making Creole filé as well as brooms and mops. At the age of thirty-four, he finally felt comfortable enough to begin his own family. He raised four children, three of which, Lionel proudly told me, later went on to college and are teachers on the university level.

LATEST NEWS

Participant in Southern Foodways Symposium.

 The Creolization of Southern Cuisine-University of Mississippi for the study of Southern Culture, October 29-31, 1999.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Newspaper November 3, 1999.

 January 2000 issue of Saveur Magazine. 

April 2000 issue of Cooking Light. 

Red Stick Farmers Market  every other Saturday.

Crescent City Farmers Market's every other Saturday from 8:00 A.M. to 12:00 noon  

Festival Acadian September 15 & 16, 2000 Lafayette, La.

Featured in Southern Belly by John T. Edge 

Napa Valley, CA Food & Wine Museum, opened in November, 2001