At Two Sisters Pecan House, find mismatched furniture, great food

Published 3:38 pm Wednesday, November 30, 2022

“We tried to keep the pharmacy open after the hospital closed and the doctor left, but it became impossible,”
she said.

Her husband was a pharmacist and they worked in a DeRidder pharmacy for a while. However, she began to think about opening a restaurant. She and her sister did so, until Clark found her new location at 1624 North Pine St.

“When PIzza Hut built their new building, I put in an offer on their old building and it was accepted. That was 2003, and I never changed the name.”

Pecan House is part of the name because the restaurant makes and sells pecan and pumpkin pies during the holidays, and delicious desserts year round. Tables and chairs are unlike most restaurants, mismatched in style and sizes, giving the dining area a homey, comfortable feel – nothing like the pizza place booths – the perfect setting for the delicious sandwiches, soups and salads served here.

Clark said the mismatched tables weren’t necessarily part of the plan to set the place apart. She knew the food would have to do that.

“We had an antique store in an old house that we had moved next to the pharmacy,” she said. “I had those tables and chairs so I used them.” She also used mismatched china, mostly vintage and real flatware, until COVID mandated certain changes.

The most popular sandwich on the menu is the chicken salad. Two Sisters Pecan House also serves tuna salad, roast beef, club, meat loaf, smoked brisket, Reubens and New Orleans style Muffalettas. Get a choice of five breads. Choose a favorite cheese, even a favorite mustard. Creamy potato soup and chicken and sausage gumbo are available daily and made from scratch.Wait staff will tell diners about the soup of the day, choices such as beef vegetable, crab bisque, creamy white chicken chili, taco soup, seafood gumbo and chicken and dumplings.  Bread pudding with rum sauce is the most popular dessert, but Clark excels at sweets. She’ll have a large, from scratch cake- and pie-of-the-day near the entrance to check out before diners choose their favorite quirky table. Order dinner with a friend and get a small soup, half sandwich, chips, pickle and cookie.

The mismatched furniture and great food combination wouldn’t work without a loyal kitchen and wait staff, Clark said. She is slowly turning over the apron, but she makes every dessert and samples every soup before it’s deemed ready to serve.

“This morning I had to get the new boy to add seasoning to the potato soup,” she noted.

She has always enjoyed cooking and was active in her church’s food program for the elderly.

When she was asked who she would choose to cook for her, living or dead, if she could choose anyone, and what she would want the person to cook, she named her mother, the woman who taught her to cook. The meal she named was liver and onions because her mother made the best and her husband never would eat it, so Clark never cooked it.

“My mother was blind; she became blind after giving birth, but she was a great cook and housekeeper. I still remember her getting down on her hands and knees on the linoleum to do the waxing, because she needed to use her hands to feel where it was needed.”

They didn’t eat many sandwiches. They didn’t eat out much, she said.  “I still remember what a treat it was to get that hamburger at the fair every year.”

People keep asking Clark when she’s going to retire. “When I get old,” is her answer.