Page 32 - ARUBA TODAY

A32 FEATURE
Thursday 14 June 2018

Marking Tabasco's 150th birthday with a tour of Avery Island

By BETH J. HARPAZ garden, live oaks and a
Associated Press 900-year-old Buddha stat-
AVERY ISLAND, La. (AP) — ue. Watch where you step:
One of the world's most fa- alligators abound.
mous condiments, Tabas- But the highlight of Jungle
co, celebrates its 150th Gardens is Bird City, where
birthday this year. on a June day about 1,000
Edmund McIlhenny cre- egrets could be seen chat-
ated the famous pepper tering and calling to one
sauce in 1868 on Avery Is- another from raised plat-
land, Louisiana. The com- forms around a lagoon.
pany is still headquartered Some swooped overhead
there, and it is still run by as an alligator floated by.
McIlhenny's descendants. The story of how the colony
But whether or not you're was established is remark-
one of those pepper fiends able. In the 1890s, snowy
who shakes Tabasco on egrets had "almost been
everything from eggs to wiped out to extinction in
burgers, Avery Island is a the U.S.," according to Erik
fun destination with a neat Johnson, director of bird
history. Tour the Tabasco conservation for Audubon
museum and factory, try Louisiana. The birds were
free samples of Tabasco-in- hunted for their feathers,
fused goodies, dine on Ca- which were used in ladies'
jun food and consider try- This June 4, 2018 photo shows Tabasco-infused olives and other food and dips in a free taste hats.
ing a bloody mary (spiked sample display on Avery Island in Louisiana, where Tabasco sauce is made. E.A. McIlhenny, son of
with Tabasco, of course). Associated Press Tabasco's founder, man-
There's also a unique na- aged to acquire eight
ture preserve called Jungle added vinegar and pack- no connection to the state ranging from soft ice cream snowy egrets, built an avi-
Gardens where you'll learn aged the result in bottles of Tabasco in Mexico, but to soda to pickles. Souve- ary for them and hand-
the story of how Avery Is- designed for cologne. The the word tabasco is de- nirs for sale include men's raised them. Then he set
land helped save an entire spicy sauce was a hit. rived from an Aztec term underwear decorated with them free. When they re-
species of bird from disap- Museum exhibits include that means "humid land" little red peppers. turned on their seasonal mi-
pearing in the U.S. vintage bottles along with and the seeds McIlhenny Next door at the 1868 Res- gration, they brought more
Despite its name, though, the wooden barrels still planted are said to have taurant, yummy Cajun birds with them and the
Avery Island is not an island. used to age the sauce. A originated in Latin America. food like gumbo, craw- numbers grew. By the time
It's a salt dome, a geologi- greenhouse displays some Across the decades Tabas- fish etouffee and boudin former U.S. President Teddy
cal phenomenon in which pepper plants, though the co has become a cultural sausage is dished out caf- Roosevelt, a champion of
an underground bed of salt peppers are now mostly phenomenon as well as a eteria-style. And as long environmental conserva-
pushes up the terrain. That grown outside the U.S. culinary staple. One vid- as someone else is doing tion, visited Avery Island in
salt is used to flavor Tabas- The sauce is bottled here, eo in the museum shows the driving, go ahead and 1915, he said 40,000 birds
co. though, and you'll get a Tabasco turning up in ev- treat yourself to a bloody were nesting there.
TABASCO HISTORY good look at the factory erything from Bugs Bunny mary. Snowy egrets have re-
As the story goes, McIl- where a stream of bright cartoons to James Bond JUNGLE GARDENS bounded nationwide since
henny planted some pep- red bottles flies past. The movies. Tabasco was used A short drive from the then, and these days sev-
per seeds he'd been given factory can produce up to as a wartime code word Tabasco complex, you'll eral thousand nesting pairs
and liked the peppers they 700,000 bottles a day, and and included as a con- find Jungle Gardens. A of snowy and great egrets
grew. He mashed them you'll see the day's tally on diment in prepackaged driving route offers a doz- typically arrive on Avery Is-
up with Avery Island salt, a digital ticker. meals for U.S. soldiers. And en numbered stops for at- land in late winter and stay
let the mixture age, then By the way, the seeds have it's sold in 195 countries and tractions including a palm through summer.q
territories worldwide.
Tabasco's current CEO,
Tony Simmons, is McIlhen-
ny's great-great-grandson.
He says only 2 to 4 percent
of family businesses make
it to the fourth generation,
but Tabasco is already in
the hands of the fifth gen-
eration.
"My family is very tied to
Avery Island," Simmons told
the AP Travel podcast "Get
Outta Here!" in an inter-
view. "Avery Island is part
of the reason we've been
able to hold onto our busi-
ness for 150 years."
This June 4, 2018 photo shows a sign directing visitors to at- FOOD AND DRINK This June 4, 2018 photo shows a display that counts how many
tractions on Avery Island in Louisiana, where Tabasco sauce is At the onsite country store, bottles of Tabasco sauce were produced at the Tabasco factory
made. on Avery Island on that day alone by early afternoon: 168,760.
Associated Press you can try free samples Associated Press
of Tabasco-infused edibles