Posted by Michael Stern on April 26, 2004
Big round beer trays heaped with crawfish emerge from the kitchen trailing hot spiced steam through the dining room as accordion notes with a triangle beat bounce from the bandstand like runaway superballs. Set back from the two-lane in the middle of nothing but rice fields and crawfish ponds, far from any town or major highway, D.I.'s is a brimful measure of Acadiana.
Daniel Isaac ("D.I.") Fruge has been known for his well-seasoned crawdads for more than twenty years. Back in the 1970s when he was a rice and soybean farmer, he began harvesting them, then boiling and serving them on weekends to locals: $5 for all you could eat. They were served in his barn the traditional way – strewn in heaps across the table – with beer to drink on the side.
D.I. and his wife Sherry now run a restaurant with a full menu that includes steaks, crabs, oysters, frog legs, flounder, and shrimp, but local crawfish, infused with brilliant spice, are still the star of the menu. The classic way to enjoy them is boiled and piled onto the beer tray – a messy meal that rewards vigorous tail-pulling and head sucking with an unending procession of the vibrant sweetwater richness that only crawdads deliver. You can have them crisp-fried – an excellent idea here in Cajun country, yielding bite-size morsels with a salty crunch; and there are crawfish pie, etouffee, and bisque.
No longer a makeshift annex to Monsieur Fruge's barn, D.I.'s is a big, modern place with multiple dining rooms and a real bandstand and dance floor. The Cajun music starts every night at 7.
Overall: Worth driving from anyplace
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Reviewers "Must Eats" List
Crawfish Platter
($13.00)
Gumbo
($4.00)
Meat Pies
($6.00)
Sweet Potato
(N/A)
"Here's the whole crawfish platter: boiled, fried, and etouffee, along with a baked sweet potato."
Michael Stern
"It was only thanks to Cajun buddy Many McNeil that we found this place. Evangeline Highway )Highway 97) takes you way into the middle of nowhere."
Michael Stern
"One of Louisiana lesser-known specialties is the meat pie, here served six to a basket as an hors d'oeuvre."
Michael Stern
"Dark, murky, and dizzyingly aromatic: this is seriously good gumbo."
Michael Stern
"Unique as is the food in Louisiana, the Bayou State is also part of the Deep South; and accordingly, D.I.'s offers this very Southern sweet potato, crowned with melting marshmallows."
Michael Stern
