Rouses Magazine

Donny Rouse was around 10 years old when he started his career at Rouses Markets. “I would bring grocery carts in from the parking lot and return them to the store for customers to use,” he told me. It was a big deal in his family, a rite of passage. “It meant we were old enough to help.” That first summer, he and his cousin worked a couple days a week, three hours a day. “We knew we weren’t old enough to really do much, but it was pretty exciting to get our feet wet and try a few different things. We were so excited just to be included.”

When Donald Rouse was a boy, every weekend and every day after school, he worked at the grocery store owned by his father. “I basically grew up there,” he told me, in his soft Houma accent. His father, Anthony, and uncle, Ciro DiMarco, opened the very first Rouses location in Houma in 1960 — 65 years ago this year. “It was our first store, a little small one, 7,000 square feet, and I just remember being with my dad, listening to him, serving customers.” (For comparison, today, a newly built Rouses might be 50,000 or even 60,000 square feet.)

“Just like down here in South Louisiana, rice is popular everywhere,” said Tim Acosta, Director of Advertising and Marketing. And just as jambalaya styles vary — think red vs. brown — so do the ways of making arroz con pollo. The dish changes from country to country and house to house, with home cooks putting their own spin on it.