In these days of relative prosperity for Biloxi, many people have forgotten how poor Biloxi was before gaming came to town. The story is that Biloxi was on its knees, and several local business men got together to discuss if there was anything they could do to revive the economy. Gaming seemed the only option.
In the 1920s Biloxi proclaimed itself the Seafood Capital of the World (I often wonder if anyone actually measured or if they just liked the self-proclaimed title?). The wooden boat building industry, making wooden luggers primarily (with cabin aft and a mainmast), was also huge with more than three hundred luggers being built annually at its height.
But Biloxi’s prosperity waned as imported shrimp made its way to this county. I honestly do not understand how shrimp can be farmed in Thailand, shipped 10,000 miles and still be cheaper that what can be caught just a few miles south in the Mississippi sound.
One of the side effects of this poverty was a fragility at the dining room table, and there some of the Coasts most well-known dishes came to be, such as shrimp boat spaghetti. A shrimper could buy a few cans of tomato sauce and some pasta, and add to that some of the smaller shrimp they would have trouble selling at the docks and a pretty good meal could be had, especially if you had a loaf of crusty French bread or a few pistolettes to go along it made by Biloxi Avenue Bakery.
Another main stay in the Biloxi diet was the po-boy. A sandwich Idea that the good folks from New Orleans like to claim to have been invented during a street car strike, when local merchants feed the “poor boys” who were on strike by splitting open baguettes and adding meats and cheese. Sorry, it just isn’t so! The frugal French have been making sandwiches out of baguettes for many generations.
There is one po-boy which locals claimed was created here, the Van Cleave special. A man in a hurry came into Rosettes on night was in a hurry, so he ordered a baguette with a crab cake on it. The owner didn’t know the man’s name but knew he came from Vancleve, so it became known as the Vancleve special. While the shrimp po-boy will always the most popular, There are many other popular combinations to choose from: hamburger, boudin (sausage) , pot roast beef and oyster. Explore the world of po-boys!
