Story by Daniel Schumacher
From hog butchering to Sunday dinners, how this cherishes, humble meat has made an enduring impact on Cajun Country.
When it comes to Cajun meats, there are a few that steal the show. Andouille—with its unique ability to make almost any dish taste better—and boudin, the ultimate Cajun snack, are found just about everywhere in the Bayou State these days (though it’s still always worth the trek to Acadiana to pick up some of the best). There are other, more niche cuts and preparations, though, that have stayed much closer to their origins and remain a cherished local tradition without all the foodie fanfare. Ponce, a sausage-stuffed pork stomach about the size of a ham, is perhaps one of the best examples.
Boucheries, where Cajuns traditionally broke down whole animals for the benefit of families and the community at large, presented Cajun cooks with opportunities to use not just the most prized bits of the beasts but all of them. That, combined with Cajun resourcefulness and deep respect for the entire animal, led to the popularization of ponce, which is also known as chaudin in some parts of the region. (Outside the region, similar dishes are called “hog maw” or “saumagen.” Scottish haggis is similar in some ways to ponce.) While the popularity of this pork sausage roast has slightly waned in the era of industrial butchery and supermarket culture, it is still very much alive in the hearts and minds of Acadians.
“I’ve been eating ponce as long as I can remember,” says Jack D. Walker of Slap Ya Mama, Ville Platte’s popular Cajun seasoning company. “Mostly, you know, it was a dish that we ate when we were having a gathering or something like that at the house, whether it was a holiday or an LSU game. It was just a dish that my dad enjoyed bringing out, especially with people that weren’t from the Ville Platte area because everyone’s like, ‘What the heck is that?!’”
While there are a few butcher shops in and around Ville Platte that offer versions of ponce—green (unsmoked), smoked, and others—the Deville family has made a name for themselves at Teet’s Food Store. Lawrence “Teet” Deville launched the store back in 1955, and it steadily evolved into the full-service grocer it is today. Like for many people in the area, ponce holds a special place in the heart of Luke Deville, who cooks with it often. “My grandfather would poke holes in it with a big cooking fork and then put, like, an inch of water in the pot and they would kind of just boil it, rotating it and keep poking holes so it wouldn’t pop, then he would brown it later,” says Luke. “A lot of people around here, they’ll brown it first. And then brown their onions and pepper, and then they’ll boil it to finish cooking it and tenderize it. But I usually just boil it first like my grandfather did and brown it with my onions and bell peppers together and put a bit more water in it, put the lid on it, and boil it down.”
Simply cooked with rice and gravy is how locals prepare ponce most often. Jack often serves it with corn maque choux, while Luke pairs it with creamy navy beans. This is the sort of dish that reminds Cajuns of treasured times spent with family and friends. Beyond the basics, Jack and Luke have seen folks do some interesting things with the delicacy, including the use of deer sausage, making the meat into kabobs and slathering them with special sauce—but it doesn’t stop there.
“I’ve been eating ponce as long as I can remember.”—Jack D. Walker of Slap Ya Mama
“A buddy of mine who lives in Lake Charles now had this crazy idea that he would make a gumbo,” says Luke. “He’d put a whole ponce in that gumbo, cooked it, and then towards the end, he sliced it. And let me tell you, it was a bit of a game changer right there. That was very interesting and tasty.”
As with many local delicacies across Louisiana, cooks are quite particular about their own preparations and often eager to vie for bragging rights at local competitions. Ville Platte had its own such tournament until 2022 at the Smoked Meat Festival, where home cooks and professionals alike would put up their best ponce preparations to see whose came out on top. Over the years, the Smoked Meat Festival was a community centerpiece that brought out some of the area’s best culinary talents. In the early 1990s, the Walker family used the festival as a proving ground for their Slap Ya Mama seasoning, and in 2012, the Deville family brought out their brand-new Jalapeño-Cheddar smoked ponce to the judging table. It took home some accolades and has remained a strong seller among their ponce lineup.
Like many old-timey techniques and ingredients, ponce has faced setbacks in the modern economy. Following supply chain disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s gotten harder for even the most popular Cajun butchers to get the pork stomachs they need to produce ponce. “A few years back, a lot of those plants had went down to skeleton crews,” says Luke. “So, we couldn’t even get the stomachs anymore. . . . Like all things, some things fade away and it’s kind of getting tough to get our hands on.”
If making a trip to the Cajun prairie to pick up some ponce in person doesn’t fit your schedule, at least you can have some quality specimens shipped right to your house. Teet’s, along with a few other specialty butchers in the area, ships its popular smoked pork ponce, the jalapeño-Cheddar version, and unsmoked ponce (which it markets as “chaudin”), along with its sausages, tasso, boudin, and cracklin’s. So, get your hands on some in whatever way you can, because as long as ponce continues to be made and shared, a piece of Louisiana will continue to flourish.
Ponce Sauce Piquante
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TEET’S FOOD STORE 2210 W. Main St., Ville Platte
