Subscribe To The
Five-Star Edition!

Shrimp remoulade.

This review originally appeared in the New Orleans Menu Daily, which brings out a full, up-to-date restaurant review every weekday. Along with local restaurant news, top-ten lists, recipes, and Tom Fitzmorris's Dining Diary. All of it is original and current, illustrated with lots of photos of New Orleans restaurants, chefs, and their food.

The price of a subscription is whatever number of dollars seems right to you. For that amount, you get full access to the daily newsletter online, an e-mail bulletin version every day, and archives of everything published since Hurricane Katrina.

If you're still not convinced, do two things: 1. Know that I'll refund all your money if you're not happy. 2. Take a look at this sample edition. Then. . .

Thank you!

Tastefully yours,
Tom Fitzmorris

Restaurant Ratings

The ratings are based mostly on the degree to which the food excites us, and a little on environment, service, and other considerations. I rate restaurants relative to all other restaurants in the New Orleans area. Here's what the stars mean to me:

starstarstarstarstar
Among the best locally.

starstarstarstar
Excellent and ambitious.

starstarstar
Worth crossing town for.

starstar
Recommended.

*
Acceptable.

No star
Unacceptable.

Cost Ratings
Each dollar sign indicates a ten-dollar range, including a normal meal for the restaurant (dinner, if they serve other meals), not including drinks, or tips. So, for example. . .

1$--$5-15
2$--$15-25
3$--$25-35

. . . and so on, with no upper limit. While this scheme may suggest mathematical precision, know that perception of price varies from diner to diner as much as the star ratings do. So consider this an estimate.

All reviews are based entirely on meals I have personally taken at the restaurant and paid for from my own pocket. I don't take free review meals, nor am I reimbursed by anybody for my restaurant expenditures.

starstarstar
pricebar

Bacco

Italian.
French Quarter: 310 Chartres. 504-522-2426. Map.
Lunch and dinner seven days.
Nice Casual
AE DC DS MC V
Website

WHY IT'S ESSENTIAL
One of the surprisingly few Italian restaurants in the French Quarter--once the leading Italian enclave in New Orleans--Bacco is different from other local Italian cafes in featuring the food of Tuscany. That style relies more heavily on roasting, olive oil, and herbs than on tomato sauces and cheese. Over the years, the menu has taken on a Creole aspect, as well, resulting in a unique selection of food.

WHY IT'S GOOD
Bacco’s menu is full of dishes found in few other local Italian restaurants. It uses first-class fresh ingredients, including some rare ones; white truffles appear most years in the fall. They make their own pasta and bake their own rustic bread. A wood-burning oven and grill also contribute the a Tuscan flavor. Service is usually deft, and the wine list has one of the best selections of Italian bottles in town. Although it's a marketing gimmick, Bacco's ten-cent martini at lunchtime keep it on the minds of many.

BACKSTORY
Owner Ralph Brennan is the oldest member of the second Brennan generation in the restaurant business. After managing Mr. B's for its first decade, Ralph and his sisters--whose mother was Italian--took a liking to the restaurants and cooking styles of Tuscany. They thought it would do well in New Orleans, so they opened Bacco in 1991. It never has been a culinary landmark, but the food has always been offbeat and interesting.

DINING ROOM
The restaurant is striking in design, with artfully-employed concrete creating the illusion of stone. The vaulted ceiling of the rear dining room is among the most unusual dining spaces in New Orleans. All the dining areas are on the small side, with unique comforts.

ESSENTIAL DISHES
Vermouth-steamed mussels.
Carpaccio (raw, thin-sliced beef with Parmigiano flakes).
Truffled fettuccine.
Lemon and parmesan salad.
Stracci (torn pasta with spinach and chicken).
Lobster ravioli.
Pappardelle pasta with crabmeat.
Seared sea scallops with brown butter.
Grilled redfish with crawfish risotto.
Filet mignon with truffle butter.
Roasted pork tenderloin.
Tiramisu.
Bacco cioccolato (a molten chocolate cake).

FOR BEST RESULTS
I can't think of a reason not to have the dime martini with lunch. Or to spend the necessary big bucks for the white truffle dinner, when they have it. (Wait until near the end of the season, when the truffles are best.)

OPPORTUNITIES FOR IMPROVEMENT
The menu doesn't have enough variety, and too often the specials fall flat.

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

SPECIAL ATTRIBUTES

ANECDOTES AND ANALYSIS

Bacco is hard to define. Although it's clearly Italian, it's not the kind of Italian food most people are used to. And some of its promotions don't seem Italian at all. This doesn't prevent them from being worthy of notice.

What's going on there right now, through October 3, is a case in point. It's a lobster and Champagne dinner. Lobster has long been a mainstay, although not to this extreme. The dinner starts with lobster bisque,then goes to the restaurant's perennial lobster-and-truffle ravioli. Next comes a tempura-fried lobster claw atop a slaw with tarragon and mustard. The entree is, logically, a whole Maine lobster.

This is the peak of the season (in a very good year, at that) for the crustaceans, so the timing is perfect. The dinner finishes with a lavender and strawberry pavlova. At $65 ($90 with four different Veuve Clicquot cuvees), this is a rather nice deal.

This review was updated with new information on 9/17/2009.