Laura Williams Broussard simmered up her first pot of gravy to sell sometime around 1968. It was then, in her own home and kitchen, that she opened what was likely Lafayette's first soul food plate lunch restaurant. She had been the best cook amongst her siblings, and took pride in feeding the family, before opening her home up to the masses. Located down a dead-end residential street, customers came from all over Acadiana to taste a bite of Laura's gravy. Laura's granddaughter, Madonna, remembers standing at a distance, watching her grandmother make each day's gravy.
 

Fire destroyed Laura's home in 1975, but her daughter-in-law, Dorothy Broussard, who everyone called Miss Dot, kept the gravy flowing from a second location through the next two decades. When deciding whether or not to pursue a third iteration of the family business, Madonna took that gravy recipe and made up her mind to cook things "the Laura's way." And in 2000, Laura's II (that's with the Roman numeral two) was born.
 

At Laura's II, Madonna Broussard keeps many of grandma Laura's original recipes intact. My favorite is the baked turkey wing, which arrives pterodactyl-sized. Big and meaty, stuffed with garlic, black pepper, and cayenne, its topmost layer of skin is crisped to a fine crackling from a final heat burst under the broiler. The original Laura's offered the dish as a Wednesday-only special, but it has since proven too popular and is available seven days a week. Still, there's never enough wings to go around. Customers often secure an order for tomorrow's lunch while eating today's. Broussard described it to me as "the race for the turkey wings."