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

Liuzza's By The Track

Neighborhood Cafe.
Esplanade Ridge: 1518 N. Lopez. 504-218-7888. Map.
Lunch and dinner continuously until 7 p.m. Monday-Saturday.
Very Casual.
AE DS MC V
Website

WHY IT'S NOTEWORTHY
Since the demise of Uglesich's, this is the dumpiest good restaurant in town--a datum that attracts the many diners who believe a neighborhood joint must be grubby to be good. Although that is clearly false, the eating here really is fine. All the corner cafe standards, poor boys to beans to gumbo, with a few upscale surprises.

WHY IT'S GOOD
Liuzza's understands everyday New Orleans food so well that it can bang out variations on the classics and have them come out even better. The shining example of that is the "breathtaking roast beef poor boy," enhanced by the simple addition of a significant amount of horseradish to the mayonnaise. I thought it was impossible for a roast beef poor boy to be improved until I had this. They make a great gumbo by adding all the seafood right before they serve it. Even ambitious dishes like barbecue shrimp are more than credible.

BACKSTORY
There have long been two good neighborhood cafes called Liuzza's, both of them in Mid-City. Each has had a series of owners. (Too long in the past for it to matter, they were the same). For reasons hard to understand, this Liuzza's has always had the better food and the lesser creature comforts. The current owner is Billy Gruber, whose family operated the Meal-A-Minit chain here in the 1950s and 1960s.

DINING ROOM
It's a bar, really, and has been for most of the past fifty years. It proximity (rock-throwing distance) from the back gate of the Fair Grounds Race Course made it a hangout for horsemen, including the major characters in that crowd. It's still easy to picture them there. The tables are jammed in any way they'll fit, and not many fit well. Everything is battered and worn out. All of which the regular customers love.

ESSENTIAL DISHES
Seafood gumbo.
Shrimp remoulade.
Panneed chicken salad.

Poor boy sandwiches:
Breathtaking roast beef.
Garlic oyster.
Hot sausage.
Corned beef.
Barbecue shrimp.

Daily lunch specials.
Red beans and rice.

FOR BEST RESULTS
If you've never been before, check the map. The restaurant is only a block from Esplanade, but the streets around there don't all run parallel and you can get turned around. Don't bother dressing down if you're coming from work. There's always somebody here wearing a tie. Don't even think of coming here during Jazz Festival.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR IMPROVEMENT
They could fix the place up a little without spoiling the non-atmosphere.

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

This review was updated with new information on 11/16/2009.

A list of all 275 full, current reviews is here.