'Swamp boy' is back with a new local cafe

Sarah K Wood | The Daily Advertiser

Show Caption Hide Caption Download the Go Lafayette app today! Go Lafayette keeps you up-to-date on where to eat, play, shop and experience the hottest nightlife.

A building at 104 S. Main St. in Washington has transformed into an up-and-coming café and live music venue called Old Courtableau Café.

The café is the newest venture of David Allemond, who along with his brother Mark owned McGee’s Landing and Swamp Tours — you may know these two as the "swamp boys."

The café immediately echoes the owner's roots and is likened to a riverside swamp house with rustic metal and wood planks making up the skeleton of the interior. There are pictures that dance across the walls with imagery of the iconic murky waters and low-hanging trees of the Atchafalaya Basin, family heirloom pictures and memorabilia, voodoo-like knick-knacks in every corner and a giant taxidermied alligator that grabs your attention with its sharp teeth grasping a tip jar.

On one end of the restaurant is a live music stage that is adorned with a giant garfish and surrounded by pictures of music legends who have graced McGee’s Landing in the past, such as Robert Plant and the late great Stevie Ray Vaughn.

Old Courtableau Café is open from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sundays. The café serves much-loved breakfast classics like beignets, pancakes, breakfast platters, build-your-own omelets and French toast.

For lunch, there is a full assortment of creative salads, sandwiches, PoBoys — such as the Mais Ga Meatball PoBoy, and a daily plate lunch special.

Dinner house specialties of the café include crab cakes, grilled or fried catfish topped with shrimp or crawfish étouffée — dishes respectively named after David's parents Curtis and Geraldine Allemond — and seafood platters with fish fresh from the Basin (we dare you to try the Swamp Gator).

"If it's not fresh, we don't serve it," said David Allemond. "We are going to be doing a lot of what we did at McGee's Landing — if they remember the great dishes we served, such as whole fried or grilled frogs, garfish boullets, turtle étouffée (which he mentioned was his favorite). We will have barbecue on Sundays, utilizing the tradition of smoked meats in the area. We are also going to have plenty of live performances with up-and-coming artists and older, more established musicians."

Born on the Bayou

David, 63, is a Henderson native with roots on his father’s side tracing back to the early Acadian settlers. His father, Curtis Allemond, grew up on a houseboat on the bayou in a time with no electricity or running water, utilizing the swamp to survive.

David shared his experiences growing up on the Atchafalaya Basin, the largest, last-remaining, wetland swamp in the country that is renowned for scenic waterscapes, ancient cypress trees and the bounty of wildlife that reside in it.

“We lived in a small village, our house was actually in the first subdivision built in town,” he recalled. “Our life was like this: When we weren’t in school we would jump on our bikes and go to the bayou to fish, and when it was cold we were hunting in the woods. We were doing things that boys do — running away with our mamas not knowing where we are, swimming across the bayou and going to the basin, and at that time, we weren’t aware that there were probably 100 alligators around us.

“We were like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. It was a fine way to grow up as a child,” he added with a smile. “In hard times, we had the skills to survive off of the land and water — a true Cajun understands that.”

His love of cooking has led him countless successes and multiple TV appearances, such as on Food Network’s “Southern Fried Road Trip.”

“I’ve always loved it," he said. "I was the oldest child in our home, and my dad was gone a lot for work so I would help my mom in the kitchen. She would have me make the beans, rice, cornbread, and Cush-Cush. Then, she showed me how to saute and make gravies. Being an avid hunter, I instantly fell in love with the craft because I could cook what I caught.

“As a person who lives on the levee, we had to be the kind of person who takes nothing and makes something out of it,” he said with authority and a pride stemming from generations on the bayou. “We didn’t throw away a big catfish head with meat on it; we would use it in some kind of way — we didn’t waste anything. Before I was 15 I could cook just about anything I wanted, most young men in our area can still do that to this day.”

The Allemond family launched McGee’s Swamp tours in 1977 and it became a popular tourist destination. The family opened McGee’s Landing Restaurant alongside the tours to serve Cajun and creole dishes that had been in the family recipe book for generations. The Allemond brothers sold McGee’s Landing and Swamp Tours to the Boy Scouts of America last year to preserve their family's legacy.

David spent several months at home testing out the retired life but found it wasn't for him. With a bit of persuasion from Mark, he was on a search to ignite something buzz-worthy in the village of Washington, the birthplace of his mother Geraldine Marie Robin Allemond.

To the brothers, Washington is a gem waiting to be polished to glory, and Mark found the perfect prospect for David: a 200-year-old relic on the National Register of Historic Places that had been abandoned for the past 70 years.

“The other business was something my family built to share and build awareness of how the Acadians lived on the rivers of the Atchafalaya — building communities in Henderson — it was all tied in with Washington," David said. "This is the third-oldest settlement in Louisiana and was the second-largest inland port in the nation before the railroads came through in the 1900s. All that time people who lived along the rivers would come to Washington to sell fish and things of that nature.

“When I found this building, I realized that I could make a masterpiece of a place with the thought of promoting interest in my mother's history,” he said. “My mom was the backbone of our family, and she was absolutely fascinated with the history of Washington. When I got here I knew that it was the right thing to do, save this building, restore it, and create what I know: and that is a nice little cafe that is the focal point in the center of town.

And David did just that, salvaging all the materials from McGee's Landing and using them to create the Old Courtableau Café.

"In order for me to feel accomplished again, was to do this and be where my heart is."

David also shared a little secret.

“When people walk through the building the building tells it all. It talks. There is such an aura around it.”

He mentioned having sighted what he believes, is a ghost.

“I've only seen one flash of light, it was seen by me and one of my employees,” he said smiling. “I believe I am putting a smile on all the faces of the spirits in this town and that they are happy to see this building come back to life.”

You can stay up to date on the latest with the Old Courtableau Café by giving a "like" to www.facebook.com/oldcourtableaucafe.