New Orleans Food & Spirits. Harvey: 2330 Lapalco Blvd. 504-362-0800.

Last Updated on Tuesday, 06 November 2012 10:20

Restaurants - Seafood Restaurants

Seafood

New Orleans Food & Spirits

Harvey: 2330 Lapalco Blvd, 504-362-0800. Map.
Casual.
AE DC DS MC V
Website

WHY IT'S NOTEWORTHY
The generic, forgettable name disguises a very good neighborhood seafood restaurant. Overloaded platters of fried oysters, shrimp, catfish, and soft-shell crabs are all prepared to order, crisp and hot. And they grill as well as they fry. The three locations have aspects of a neighborhood cafe, with poor boys, beans, gumbo, and specials.

WHY IT'S GOOD
The corny menu language makes one suspicious, but there's nothing fake. These people really know how to cook. The grilled and stuffed fish is also good. Some of the specialties are overwhelmed with thick, blanketing sauces, but even those are edible. Great daily specials, with the Thursday rabbit with white beans being one of the best dishes of its kind anywhere.

Covington. BACKSTORY
The restaurant is the successor to a little neighborhood place in Houma. The Bergeron family--which has enough members to run four restaurants (one of them is in Birmingham), opened the original West Bank NOF&S in the early 1990s, and instantly became a packed house. The Bucktown location came next, occupying the building where R&O used to be. The Covington branch appeared in 2004.

DINING ROOM
The Harvey restaurant is a pleasant but busy dining room in a suburban style. The Bucktown location of this three-unit seafood specialist is a big, somewhat crowded room whose windows gaze onto the levee. The lake is on the other side of that for postprandial walks. The Covington restaurant is the most scenic, suspended as it is above the Bogue Falaya River.

ESSENTIAL DISHES [»=Recommended]
Menus vary slightly from one location to another. Starters
»Raw and grilled oysters (Bucktown only).
Onion rings
Crawfish rolls
Spinach-artichoke dip
»Crawfish corn soup
»Seafood gumbo

Catfish with pecans.

Entrees
»Grilled yellowfin tuna steak
Grilled catfish
Grilled, smoked chicken breast
»Two pork chops, grilled or Hawaiian
Ribeye steak
Atlantic salmon, Hawaiian glaze.
»Fried catfish, shrimp, oyster or combo platter
»Redfish Pontchartrain (grilled or blackened, cream sauce with shrimp)
Crab-stuffed, grilled catfish, seafood cream sauce
Blackened chicken breast, angel hair pasta, seafood cream sauce)
Crab cake Pontchartrain
»Catfish Loozianne (with Creole crawfish stew or gumbo)
Angel hair pasta, garlic cream sauce, blackened shrimp, catfish or chicken
Swamp pasta (shrimp, creamy cheese sauce, angel hair)
Crawfish stew over rice
»Catfish Lafayette (fried or grilled, pasta with seafood cream sauce)
Stuffed eggplant, crabmeat, pasta with seafood cream sauce
»Blackened tuna, pasta with seafood cream sauce
Blackened ribeye steak, pasta

Sandwiches
»Fried catfish, shrimp, or oyster poor boy
Hamburger
Grilled or blackened chicken breast on bun

Red beans and a pork chop.

Specials
»Red beans and rice, pork chop (MO)
Shrimp stew, fried shrimp (TU)
»Panneed chicken, pasta with red sauce (WE)
»»White beans with stewed rabbit, pork chop, or catfish (TH)
Fried eggplant with shrimp cream sauce (FR)

Desserts
»Bread pudding

FOR BEST RESULTS
The portions are very large. Even a salad might push a meal into the Too Much zone if you have an entree. To get Thursday's rightly famous stewed rabbit and white beans, show up early. They always run out.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR IMPROVEMENT
The coatings on the seafood taste and look exactly the same, giving a lack of contrast to the platter. Don't get too excited about complex, saucy dishes: they sound better than they really are. The menu, which hasn't changed in a long time, is due for renovation. The automatic tip policy in the West Bank NOF&S upsets some people.

FACTORS OTHER THAN FOOD
Up to three points, positive or negative, for these characteristics. Absence of points denotes average performance in the matter.

Dining Environment
Consistency +1
Service +1
Value +1
Attitude +1
Wine and Bar -1
Hipness -1
Local Color +1

SPECIAL ATTRIBUTES

Courtyard or deck dining

Good view

Small private room

Open Monday lunch and dinner

Open all afternoon

Unusually large servings

Quick, good meal

Good for children

Easy, nearby parking

No reservations

< Prev		Next >

Inside NOMenu's Restaurant Reviews

Click on any restaurant in the list at left to go to a full, detailed review. Although over 450 restaurants have current reviews here, almost 1200 restaurants are open in the New Orleans area. It's impossible to cover all of them. I've tried for 38 years, but I keep falling farther behind as the pace of new restaurant openings increases, and the rate at which the old ones change does too. My review strategy is to go into great depth about the restaurants I believe are most essential to the dining scene, and to keep my eyes open for rising stars .

The ¤ symbols in the right-hand column of the restaurant lists show the ratings. The ratings primarily depict the degree to which the food is exciting. Environment, service, and other considerations are included in the calculation, but have a smaller impact on the rating than the food does. We rate restaurants relative to all other restaurants in the New Orleans area. (Not "for what it is.") Here's what the stars mean:

Among the best locally.

Excellent and ambitious.

Recommended.

Acceptable.

Marginal or less.

No Rating
Not Reviewed.

Cost Ratings. The price bar under the star ratings on the reviews gives an estimate of the cost of a typical meal for the restaurant. The range is plus or minus five dollars from the spot marked on the graphic. This is based on dinner in most places. It includes a typical beverage service, but not tax or tip. Eating habits vary so much from one diner to another that this should not be considered as having mathematical precision.

Review Method. I research and write all the reviews myself, based entirely on meals I personally took in the restaurants. I pay for all review meals from my own pocket. I don't accept free review meals, nor am I reimbursed by anybody for my restaurant expenditures.

Recommended Dishes.The "Essential Menu" section of the review is a selection of the restaurant's menu. Dishes marked with the "»" symbol are especially recommended. I am in the process of expanding this section to include nearly the entire menu, but that's a very large, ongoing project.

I May Be Wrong. I invite you to agree, disagree, or question any of my reviews. This is just my opinion here, and although my reviews are carefully considered and informed by decades of information gathering, I don't pretend that mine is the only possible viewpoint. If you have a different point of view, write me: tom@nomenu.com. Let me know if I may publish your thoughts in the newsletter.

Tastefully yours,
Tom Fitzmorris

Joomla Templates at Simple Themes