For 20 years, chef John Strand’s brand has been fine dining. A five-time Golden Fork finalist in the Louisiana Food Prize competition, the Shreveport-based chef is invited into kitchens to prepare baked Camembert with port roasted pear and walnut, steak au poivre and a Torta Barozzi Italian chocolate cake flavored with rum coffee.
Strand’s love of food and cooking goes hand in hand with his love of Louisiana. “Louisiana is literally the only state that has a cuisine that is indigenous to itself, Creole-Cajun,” Strand said. As much as he admired it, it was also a cuisine he didn’t want to be known for. “I’m not Creole or Cajun, and I wouldn’t do it justice. But that’s not to say I don’t know the flavor profiles well.”
Strand said Louisiana also needs to be known for its barbecue, and he is throwing down the gauntlet by telling any and all that he is creating the quintessential flavor profile for "Louisiana bar-be-que." Strand’s own style of barbecue can be found at his new Shreveport restaurant, The Magnolia Pit, which opened last month.
In doing so, he is poking the four acknowledged barbecue top dogs with a stick. They are Texas (mesquite based, vinegar or tomato based), Memphis (dry rub with white and brown sugars), Kansas City (sweet, ketchup based) and Carolina (tomato and mustard).
Strand is a Texan by upbringing who began cooking when he was 6 years old. His formative years were spent in the Lone Star State bull riding and motocross racing. Then came 25 years in the Army, the bulk of which was in criminal investigations. During his stints as an investigator at Army posts in the U.S. and abroad, he found time to attend culinary classes to hone his cooking skills.
In 2006, he launched Accents Personal Chef Service, which offers fine dining menus for private dinners and events and operates a private dining space in Shreveport.
Strand said he knows his claim is an audacious exercise of "in your face" barbecue. “This is a whole different flavor,” he said. “This is a style of barbecue that we absolutely intend to put on the map as a recognized style.”
“I just kept wracking my brain thinking we’ve got a state that has a cuisine indigenous to itself; why in the world is there not a flavor profile with our state’s cuisine in mind married with barbecue?” he said. For 18 months, Strand went back and forth with ideas for his barbecue concept.
First was to create a blend of flavors that pays homage to Louisiana. To capture that essence, Strand knew that it had to include the so-called "holy trinity" of base ingredients — bell pepper, onion and celery. His restaurant kitchen staff purees the trinity down to liquid and folds it and its wonderful flavor into the barbecue sauce.
Strand says his sauce is unique. “We have developed what we call ‘B to the Fifth Power’ — brown butter bourbon barbecue sauce. We emulsify the brown butter, and it gives it a sauce that tastes barbecuey and smoky. It ends with an almost creamy mouth feel,” Strand said.
“We had a diner here recently and he said, ‘I know barbecue.’ And I said, ‘No, you know Texas barbecue. As much as Texas would fight us on this, they don’t have a monopoly on barbecue. It’s fantastic, but it’s a style of barbecue. I have my own.”
Google reviews are already coming in with comments that range from “I will DEFINITELY be coming back and telling everyone I know,” and “OMG” to “The baked beans were damn good.” It’s a good start for this established chef, his new restaurant and a whole new barbecue flavor, but Strand has a clear view of what he wants next.
“I want to be just like Franklin’s in Austin. People travel to Austin just to have their barbecue. People line up at 6 in the morning for the 11 a.m. opening and they’re open until they sell out.” Just three weeks in, Strand said he has already had multiple sell-out days, and he knows that more will follow.