Seasoned in Louisiana
Chef Johnnie G, corporate chef for Guidry’s Catfish and Ocean Select Seafood
A Conversation with Chef Johnnie G
by Jude Theriot
Guidry’s Catfish, founded in 1975 by Bobby and Debbie Guidry, has grown from a humble 20-by-20-foot operation into one of the nation’s leading producers of U.S. farm-raised catfish.
The Henderson-based company, with a recently-opened state-of-the-art production facility, now processes over 1.2 million pounds of catfish each week, employs more than 400 people, and continues to expand. Their sister company, Ocean Select, carries that legacy forward with premium Gulf shrimp, Louisiana crawfish, and the well-known Louisiana Select brand, supplying more than 1,500 customers across the Southeast.
Yet despite their size and reach, the companies remain rooted in hospitality, Louisiana values, and an unwavering commitment to quality. In Cajun Country, the bayous may be shallow, but family traditions run deep.
At the center of Guidry’s culinary creativity is Corporate Chef Johnnie G, a Clinton, Louisiana native whose cooking reflects the dual influences of her Cajun bayou grandmother and her country-cooking grandmother from North Louisiana. After years in restaurants, food development, and even poultry science, Johnnie now leads recipe creation, product development, cooking videos on social media, and public outreach for Guidry’s Catfish and Ocean Select Seafood. Her warmth and wit and deep knowledge of Louisiana food culture shine through on her cooking show Seasoned in Louisiana.
I recently sat down with Chef Johnnie to talk cooking, culture, catfish—and what makes St. Martin Parish unlike anywhere else.
Chef Johnnie G in action on her cooking show, Seasoned in Louisiana
What is your job title, and what do you do in that role?
I’m a corporate chef for Guidry’s Catfish and Ocean Select Seafood. I do product development, I do marketing and shows, I do customer relations. Like, I was just in Mississippi with Rouses last week, doing cooking demos.
How long have you been with Guidry’s?
Two years. Before that, though, I had worked with them for about three years when I was at Crawfish Town, doing recipes for their website. And so they asked me to come work full time because they really didn’t have anybody to go to the shows, you know, the food shows, the associated grocery shows, that kind of thing. So I say I’m semi-retired, but I’m not. I’m just not in the kitchen anymore.
Guidry’s homestyle breaded catifsh and hush puppiess
And before that what did you do?
I was at Crawfish Town for almost four years. Before that, I was at Little Big Cup in Arnaudville. In this role, I get to do different things. I still get to be creative, and I still get to cook on my show, Seasoned in Louisiana.
Where did you grow up?
I’m from North of Baton Rouge. I grew up in Clinton, Louisiana.
And how did you end up in St. Martin Parish?
So you’re probably wondering where my accent comes from. I have a bachelor’s degree in poultry science, and I went to Mississippi State. My first job was with Tyson Foods in North Alabama. I like to freeze to death, it’s so cold! Then I went to Georgia and worked for Conagra Foods. So for about 10 years, I was away. Then I came back, and I worked for LSU Ag Center. I was just happy to be home, even though it was in North Louisiana. And then I met my husband. He owned a generator business in Monroe, and he was putting in a new business in Broussard, and we were looking for a place to live here, and we rode around, and we rode around everywhere—Abbeville, New Iberia— and when we came to Breaux Bridge, I was like, oh my God, I love this town. We lived right by Poche’s. And we finally found a house in Butte La Rose, and that’s where we live now. On the water, I love it.
Ocean Select premium Gulf shrimp
What do you like to do in your free time?
I love fishing.
Where do you go?
In my backyard. Right there in Butte La Rose.
You live on the canal?
Yeah, Herman Dupuis Road. People always tell me that I say that wrong. That’s been my biggest thing, pronouncing stuff. They’re like, shut up. That’s not how you say that. No, the only thing I’ve seen the last two or three weekends has been like a canoe or a kayak, which they’re brave, because you should see the alligators.
Oh, I kayak in Butte La Rose all the time.
Oh, my God. They’re huge. There’s a lot of alligators in there. And right now they’re so territorial. I’ve seen them bump their heads and seen them on the bank.
Chef Johnnie G demonstrating Guidry’s products
And you have a cooking show?
Yes, it’s called Seasoned in Louisiana, and I promote our catfish and our shrimp, just simple recipes. Sometimes I do like three different ones. You don’t think thirty minutes is a long time, but it’s a long time when you have to talk for thirty minutes! And I guess from being in the restaurant, I talk so fast, you know? And they’re like, okay, now what? So I’ve gone from doing one dish to three dishes. You can’t cook in front of a camera like you can cook by yourself. And I’m not used to explaining every little step. That was the hardest part for me.
Because they were like, okay, just pretend like they don’t know anything. And it’s true, when it comes to being in the kitchen, a lot of people don’t know even the basics. Especially young people. They didn’t grow up in the kitchen. One time I asked someone to go get a cup of flour and they came back with a half gallon.
Where can people watch the show?
Episodes premiere on Mondays at 6 p.m on KDCG-TV and it replays on Fridays at 6. And then right after it airs, it goes on YouTube. You can watch all of the episodes on Guidry’s Catfish YouTube channel and the Guidry’s Catfish website has all of my recipes.
Louisiana Select breaded shrimp are air fryer ready
What’s special about St. Martin Parish?
There’s no place like it. I have friends and family that come here from Baton Rouge and they’re so shocked. They’re like, oh my God, people are so nice here. Everywhere you go. “Hey, hey, how are you doing?” Even if they don’t know you. It’s just the people here. They’re so nice. The food is different. It’s different than what I grew up with. Different from Baton Rouge. Different from New Orleans. We cook a lot of the same things, the same ingredients, but not the same way. That’s what I try to communicate to people everywhere I go. It’s a global attraction to this place. If I meet somebody from out of state, they’re like, oh, we want to go to New Orleans so bad. I was like, you don’t want to go to New Orleans. This is where you want to go. This is what you want to do. This is where you want to eat. If you want to experience true Louisiana food and culture, come to St. Martin Parish.
What’s something that people do different here?
I made a tomato gravy one time—and that’s something that I grew up with—but a lot of people have never heard of that here. My grandmother, my mama’s mom was from North Louisiana, Wisner and Faraday, all of that. I remember my first Lent here, because I’m not Catholic, and I was doing a special with sausage. And I was told, “Oh, you can’t do that. It’s Lent.” I said, “What are you talking about? I don’t know what that is.” They’re like, “We don’t eat meat on Fridays during Lent.” I didn’t know that. I’m Baptist. If I go to Baton Rouge and I cook for my sister, they say, “It’s so spicy. It’s too spicy.” And I’m like, no, it’s not.
It’s interesting, even within St. Martin Parish, Henderson cooks a certain way, Catahoula, Cecilia, St. Martinville, they have their own different styles of cooking and seasoning. You can almost like taste something and know where it was made. For example, I’ve heard that Cecilia likes to use black pepper a lot . . .
Like, my grandmother used black pepper in the étouffée. She made a crawfish étouffée. Now my other grandmother, she was from South Louisiana and no, no black pepper. Now North Louisiana uses a lot of black pepper. They like black pepper. And boudin, where we grew up, there was only one place that had it. One place, Jerry Lee’s, and it was nothing like here. It was a lot of rice. But we didn’t know any different until I came over here. I was like, oh my God, wow. Cracklings are something unique here, too, and another thing was chili dogs. I was like, what is up with the chili dogs everywhere? Because we never really ate chili dogs unless it was Halloween, or it was cold outside, and we were having a bonfire. My friend had brought us some chili dogs the other day. We were camping or something. I was like, oh my God, this is so good. Now, I’m addicted to chili dogs.
We grew up eating chili dogs at that little snowball stand in Henderson. Now they call it The Sweet Shop, Yeah. We’d always stop for chili dogs.
That’s just not something that we grew up doing. And people around here for their chili dogs, it’s like a chili war or something. Everybody has their favorite. It’s just different.
Guidry’s breaded catfish are air fryer ready
Any new products in the works?
We’re working getting our child nutrition label. It’s mostly for school lunch, and it has a barcode on the back. And when the schools order it, they just scan that barcode and it puts everything automatically in their system when they’re ordering, all the nutrient information. Yeah, so we’re working on that.
Where can people follow you and your work?