Taste With Tori: Catahoula Brings Taste Of New Orleans To South Philadelphia
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PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – We're just days away from Mardi Gras and what better way to celebrate than with some Cajun cuisine? In this week's Taste with Tori, she visits Catahoula, which brings the taste of New Orleans to South Philadelphia.
You can't beat the voodoo vibe, the kick and spice, the colors -- and you don't have to fly the bayou.
Catahoula is dishing out classic New Orleans' cuisine.
The owner is Shlomo Kaufman, an Israeli-born chef who found his first love in Israel but found the love of cooking and Cajun food in America after road-tripping to Arizona to visit his daughter at school.
"Every time I drove, I made time to stop in New Orleans," Kaufman said. "I fall in love with it because it gave me something from my childhood, the same kind of spices and tastes in the food."
So eventually he opened Catahoula.
Now, what's a Catahoula?
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"It's a state dog of Louisiana," said Kaufman.
The first dish Vittoria tried was the BBQ shrimp that was sitting pretty on top of homemade cornbread.
"I'm tasting the peppers, onions and the cornbread with the sweetness it's like a long trombone," Tori said.
She also tried their Gumbo.
"It's drippy and decadent," Tori said.
She says the Jambalaya uses a perfect play on seasonings.
"They play on seasonings are so fun and so here and there you're just stimulated to find out where its coming from, you're like where is it?" Tori said.
And finally the Soft Shell Crab Po Boy sandwich is going to keep you coming back for more.
"The soft shell crab with that crack, crunchy crust, fresh tomato and zing, heat from the horseradish," Tori said.