Prudhomme, a sharecropper’s son from rural Opelousas, Louisiana, was an avowed Popeyes fan, taking a LIFE magazine journalist there on a 1983 tour of his personal culinary journey. For a while in the mid-’90s, in fact, one Popeyes promotion offered a free bottle of Prudhomme’s Magic Pepper Sauce with purchase.īut their relationship was more than just opportunistic co-branding. His line of “magic” seasonings sold in grocery stores cemented the idea that Louisiana’s unique food hinged on spice blends-just like the secret blend that flavored Popeyes’ chicken. was discovering New Orleans cuisine, thanks in large part to chef Paul Prudhomme, whose restaurant, K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen, was brought as a pop-up to San Francisco in 1983, then to New York in 1985. At the exact same time, the rest of the U.S. John, to the children’s show it sponsored on local TV ( kids in the audience were given a chicken meal to eat on the air). Throughout the 1980s, even as it expanded across the Southeast and beyond, Popeyes was deeply rooted in New Orleans-from the jingle sung by Dr. “I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed with Popeyes’ fried chicken, which is an amazing thing to say,” says Acheson. Praise these biscuits, they are yum.” And then there’s the chicken, “just the most delicious chicken,” according to Dufresne, with a combination of flavor and consistent execution that places it at the top of the fast-food heap. ![]() But here stand I, a waving-my-hand-in-the-air kinda convert. The biscuits, meanwhile, have a high-profile fan in pastry chef Shuna Lydon, who wrote, “Except for the odd In-N-Out burger once every few years, fast food is not my thing. ![]() But the truth is that Popeyes’ connection to the food world goes back way before normcore posturing, and it’s intimately bound to New Orleans’ own culinary renaissance.” “It’s easy to peg their love as ironic, the same winking hipsterism that made watery PBR the top-selling beer in Williamsburg for most of the 2000s. It’s crispy on the outside and fatty from the skin, with the saltiness from the red beans and rice-it’s good eating.” All’Onda chef Chris Jaeckle, who once received a box of Popeyes with a candle stuck in it in lieu of a birthday cake, likes the red beans so much he offered this pro move: “Peel the skin off the thigh and use that as the taco shell, and fill it with the red beans and rice. When asked where to find the platonic ideal of the dish, Cochon chef Donald Link named Popeyes. Leruth’s red beans-an ancient Creole tradition that’s as deeply emblematic of New Orleans as Mardi Gras-still inspire reverence. ![]() In 1971, LIFE magazine called the food at LeRuth’s “not only perfect in execution but also inventive and imaginative” the New Orleans Underground Gourmet guide called it “a culinary miracle…one of the finest eating places in the world.” Those biscuits, as well as the dirty rice and red beans and rice, were created for Copeland by New Orleans chef Warren Leruth, whose eponymous restaurant led the Creole-food renaissance when it opened in 1965. It wasn’t until 1983, 11 years and more than 300 locations in, that Popeyes added biscuits to its menu. And while that chicken recipe is all Copeland’s own-even after he sold the chain, he retained the rights to the Cajun spice blend, licensing it back to Popeyes for over 20 years until the brand finally purchased it from him in 2014 for $43 million-some of the chain’s most beloved dishes came from a high-profile friend. He quickly becomes New Orleans’ most polarizing zillionaire ( Ann Rice hated him, speedboat salesmen loved him). In 1972, after a lukewarm reception, he amps up the spice in his recipe, renames the place after Gene Hackman’s character in The French Connection, and crowds go wild. The Popeyes origin story is well-trod territory: Founder Al Copeland starts a doughnut stand in the New Orleans suburbs, but switches to fried chicken when he sees a neighbor doing well with it. But the truth is that Popeyes’ connection to the food world goes back way before normcore posturing, and it’s intimately bound to New Orleans’ own culinary renaissance. It’s easy to peg their love as ironic, the same winking hipsterism that made watery PBR the top-selling beer in Williamsburg for most of the 2000s. Wylie Dufresne served it at his wedding.įor years, Popeyes has been the food world’s dirty little not-so-secret- the fried chicken of choice for the who’s who of the chef set. ![]() David Chang might not have got through the Momofuku Ko revamp without it. So are Dale Talde, Paul Qui, Anthony Bourdain, and Hugh Acheson.
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