The Culture

Gumbo carries two kitchens in its name and its pot. Okra arrived through the slave trade, and the word gumbo most likely comes from a West African word, Bambara gombo, or from Kimbundu ki ngombo, both meaning okra. Choctaw cooks supplied filé, ground sassafras leaves used to thicken soups and stews. By 1764 Africans in New Orleans were mixing cooked okra with rice, and in 1803 Governor Laussat's soiree featured 24 different gumbos. The sassafras on this panel is a Native plant doing work in an African-rooted dish.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• E. D. White Historic Site — 20 mi
  A National Historic Landmark house of about 1790 on Bayou Lafourche, built by enslaved people and home to two Whites, a governor and a Chief Justice, with an exhibit on the bayou's history.
• Whitney Plantation — 21 mi
  A museum on a former sugar plantation along the River Road that tells its story through the people who were enslaved there, with memorials to 107,000 enslaved Louisianans and 2,200 children.
• LSU Rural Life Museum — 23 mi
  Four slave cabins moved from Welham Plantation and a working-plantation row of more than twenty saved buildings, on land the Burden family held as Windrush plantation since the 1830s.
• Wetlands Acadian Cultural Center — 23 mi
  A Jean Lafitte National Historical Park center on Bayou Lafourche with Acadian and bayou-life exhibits, a 200-seat theater and ranger-guided boat tours to the E. D. White house.

More markers nearby

• The Swamp — steps away
• Central Agricultural School — steps away
• African American Life — steps away
• Bicentennial Jazz Plaza — steps away