Gumbo season in South Louisiana does not wait for a cold front, but the first chilly week of November sure helps. When the calendar fills up with parties, school programs and holiday shopping, a pantry shortcut made just down I-10 in Gonzales can save a weeknight.

More than a century of beans

Blue Runner's story starts in 1918, when 21-year-old Pierre Chauvin opened the Union Canning Company in Union, Louisiana, putting up figs, blackberries and cane syrup in his backyard. In 1946 he partnered with Clay Englade, moved to Ascension Parish and renamed the business Gonzales Product Co. Their first canned red beans came from a recipe Chauvin learned from his grandmother, and they won so many parish fair prizes that the company eventually took the name Blue Runner, after the ribbons on a blue-ribbon medal.

Everything is still made in Gonzales. The family-owned company cooks millions of pounds of red beans a year in big custom kettles rather than in the can, and on gumbo day the plant turns out 40,000 pounds of gumbo, starting with a roux and fresh vegetables.

Pick your gumbo

Blue Runner makes several gumbo bases, and each has its own personality. The Seafood base uses fish stock and okra with a medium dark roux, the Chicken base pairs chicken stock with a medium dark roux, Gumbo Ya-Ya goes darker, and the Cajun base leans on beef stock and extra spices.

The company's 15-minute Chicken and Sausage Gumbo Ya-Ya is about as easy as it gets: brown andouille, add the trinity, pour in the base, stir in rotisserie chicken and serve over rice. Our tip: the weekend after Thanksgiving, try it with leftover turkey.

Good neighbors

Blue Runner has a long relationship with Second Harvest Food Bank and has helped provide more than three million meals across the Gulf Coast during the pandemic and after disasters.

Find a store through the locator on the Blue Runner site, then put a pot on.

Photo courtesy of Blue Runner Foods.