Monday, June 14, 2010
1101 Restaurants Open Around Town
Susan Spicer's nationally-famous restaurant Bayona marked twenty years in business a couple of months ago. They were so busy then that they put off the celebration until the summer calm moved in. It's a two-day event that begins today with a slate of cooking classes and food and wine tastings. These involve chefs--many of them big deals in their own right now--who worked at Bayona at one time or another. Some names: John Harris, Gregg Collier, Donald Link, Ashley Mcgee, and Michelle Nugent. The wines come from classy vineyards: Kalin Cellars and Stony Hill, to name two. (Mike Chelini, the winemaker at Stony Hill, will be there).
Tuesday is the big gala. It starts with a cocktail reception with the chefs and the winemakers, then proceeds into a five-course dinner prepared by the chefs. This promises to be a real spectacular, at $265 per person, limited to forty-eight guests. There are still a few seats left for this. For details and reservations call 504-525-4455.
Bayona. French Quarter: 430 Dauphine. 504-525-4455.
And speaking of Susan Spicer. . .
Susan Spicer's New Neighborhood Restaurant
Mondo Opens Softly
Over The Weekend
Mondo, the new restaurant from Chef Susan Spicer, opened without much fanfare over the weekend. That did not, however, keep the place from being very busy. The neighbors in Lakeview have kept their eyes and ears open to the any signs of its appearance, and didn't miss the appearance of people in the dining rooms for run-throughs earlier in the week.
Susan, who lives in Lakeview herself, has been thinking about something like this for some time. Not long ago she sold her share of Herbsaint to her partner and former Bayona sous chef Donald Link, and flipped the investment into Mondo.
The space was most recently Lago, with Barataria, Bacchi, and the original location of the Steak Knife there in the past. (The Steak Knife moved across Marshal Foch Street in the 1990s.) In the Bacchi era a brick, wood-burning pizza oven had been added, which Susan is now using. "It wasn't easy," she told me. "Everything here was under water for a long time after Katrina, and the pizza oven developed some issues when we fired it up. All fixed now."
"Mondo" means world. "We will have a world of food, for everybody" she says, noting that Mondo's menu was planned to appeal to the tastes of an entire family. This would be a family with a more ambitious palate than my own does, I'd say--although I personally like the sound of most of this). Here are some selected items from the menu:
- Fried Hominy with Chiles and Lime
- Spreads & Croutons (Taramosalata, White Bean-Roast Garlic, Green Olive Tapenade)
- Carnitas Gorditas
- Jerked Chicken Thighs with Pineapple Salsa
- Chicken Tortilla Soup with Hominy
- Ceviche with Tortilla Chips and Guacamole
- Creamy Crab Toast
- Wood Oven-roasted Artichoke
- Pizza
- Mondo Burger with Griddled Onions, Fries
- Broiled or Sautéed Gulf Fish
- Crawfish Etouffée
- Slow roasted Pork Shoulder
- Broiled Lamb T-bones
- Whole Roasted Fish
- Mac ‘n’ Cheese
- Flaugnarde (thick crepe) with Seasonal Fruit
- Double Chocolate Cake
- Cinnamon Beignets
Prices for the appetizers are mostly between $5 and $10, with entrees running from $11 to $20, with a couple of large plates with higher prices. Mondo will be open Monday through Saturday for dinner only right now, with Sunday brunch and daily lunches in the plans for the near future.
The opening of Mondo pushed the population of restaurants in New Orleans past 1100, for the first time in history. We had 809 restaurants before Katrina. A list of all open restaurants can be found here.
Mondo. Lakeview: 900 Harrison Ave . 504-224-2633. Eclectic.
Friday, June 4. Stormy Weather. Low Power. Lake House. The Causeway closed twice today, the blame going to the black clouds, high winds, threat of tornadoes, blasting rainfall, and lightning. That gave me all the excuse I needed to remain at the Cool Water Ranch and hope, as I broadcast the radio show, that lightning wouldn't hit the telephone line that sends my audio back to the studio. [I wonder if I've ever before written a sentence that included three words ending in "-dio".]
Mary Leigh has been on low power since graduation day. She went to the doctor a few days ago to check it out. She was found to have had a common ailment among teenagers that would go away on its own in a few days. This gave her an excuse to sit of the sofa all day long, alternating between watching her new favorite television show Friends (we didn't have television reception when that show was on the air, so it's all new to her) and texting her network of pals.
Sometimes she even talked to me. She says that she feels unconnected to life all of a sudden, and that this is vaguely disturbing. For me to say that I remember how it was when I was her age would have been a non-starter, so I didn't. But I do recall the precise mental state she describes. While recovering from flu-like symptoms (which I always blamed on the breakfast we were fed after the graduation Mass), I too was anxious about no longer having a school to dictate my goals. I found the yawning chasm of The Rest Of My Life opening before me overwhelming. Grabbing at shreds, I began every morning with the exercise routine in our P.E. classes at Rummel--as if that were something I should have taken with me from the school. The silliness of that soon became apparent. I never liked exercising to begin with. I moved on, and the anxiety went away.
Mary Ann said she would be amenable to dinner a deux, since our daughter was hors de combat. [What's with all this French, now?] I suggested we go to Stone's Bistro, a place that opened in Slidell in October. But she had already made a lake crossing today and didn't want to drive that far. "How about the Lake House?" A classic MA plan: to attend a restaurant that's packed to the rafters, with no reservations.
We went there anyway, of course. All the parking spaces were full. People were standing around on the front lawn. This did not bode well for immediate seating. But that would be all right with me. A cocktail sounded good.
But there was no wait. Somehow a table opened up--in a corner, yet, with windows on two sides--and there we were. Many restaurants that came and went over the decades in this old building, and most of them made changes. Nevertheless, my mind connected instantly with the first time I ate here. It was around this time of year in 1974, and I was researching one of the first restaurant articles I ever wrote for New Orleans Magazine. This was Bechac's then--as it had been since the turn of the century. Bechac's had the comportment of a classy restaurant whose advanced age allowed it to be a little tired, worn, and imperfect. It reminded me of places like Maylie's and Antoine's. Old waiters in starched jackets conducted service as if it were mildly religious. But Bechac's was really just a straightforward seafood house, a lot like the restaurants on the opposite shore of Lake Pontchartrain. But I allowed myself to be charmed by the antiquity. Thirty-six years later, with a very hip, young crowd and a creative kitchen, I still am. I didn't bring that up, though. Mary Ann doesn't like old-time restaurants.
We began with a pretty amuse-bouche, a fried shrimp standing up in a pool of beurre blanc and demi-glace. Cayman Sinclair, the owner (he also has the LA Grill), came by and all but insisted that we try the shrimp and grits. They were barbecue shrimp, in fact, with the heads off--but, as quite a few other restaurants have found, this is a nice combination with the grits.
Also on the table was a wedge salad made of butter lettuce. Although that's better than iceberg, for some reason I miss the iceberg when the salad is a wedge. Maybe it's something going on between the iceberg's milkiness and the intense blue cheese.
Shrimp made its third starring appearance tonight in the entree course. MA, the Fried Shrimp Editor for The New Orleans Menu, fell for the parmesan-encrusted fried shrimp--largely because they came with truffled fries, which I must say had my eye, too. She was unimpressed by the shrimp.
I followed the waiter's advice and took the nightly special: a sort of two-thirds veal Oscar. The veal--which was sliced too thick for something like this--sat atop the sauce combination that looked and tasted familiar. The photos gave a clue: it looked like the same combination brought under the amuse-bouche. Topped with crabmeat and slightly overdone asparagus, it nevertheless was good enough that I remained in a good mood. We watched it get dark over the lake (no visible sunset this time of year, though) and talked about the usual matters. There are still no plans for vacation.
We wrapped up with a slab of bread pudding for me while Mary Ann looked on. When we got home, Mary Leigh was still blobbing on the sofa, her head stopped up.
Lake House. Mandeville: 2025 Lakeshore Dr. 985-626-3006. Contemporary Creole.
Saturday, June 5. Hungry Town In Harvey. Dinner With Li'l Sis At Broussard's. The Marys went to Baton Rouge for some reason, leaving me to my own devices for the day. I had no radio show to do: the Saints are in their mini-camp, whatever that is. My showtime was used to discuss the tiniest of details concerning the team. Except one that Bobby and Deke never ask about: What do the players eat? That seems an important issue to me. I know that my eating affects my performance, most of which involves endurance as opposed to energy peaks.
This week's autograph session for my new books is at the Barnes and Noble in Harvey. This bookstore hold the record for the greatest sale of my signed books in a single session. When the first edition of Tom Fitzmorris's New Orleans Food premiered, I autographed 297 books in two and a half hours. There was a line through the store for quite awhile. It was right before Christmas, but still! And on the West Bank?
It was nothing like that today. No holidays to pump volume. Insane heat outside, punctuated by deadly lightning and thunderstorms. Excuses, excuses.
When Mary Ann knew she would not be around today, she told me what I should do in her absence. "You ought to call your sister Lynn and take her to dinner." As it happened, I was thinking of that very thing.
I was also overdue for a dinner at Broussard's, where chef-owner Gunter Preuss and his son Marc have been tweaking the menu lately. Unlike the other three of the classic French-Creole restaurants in the Quarter, Broussard's has been modernizing its offerings for some time, particularly the entree section.
For whatever reason, though, our dinner was one that could have been had here ten or even twenty years ago. Lynn was interested in the prix-fixe menu, in which three courses come to the table for $35. This is more limited than it once was; the specials sheet that ran until recently had three choices in each course, but it was a bit more expensive. Now there's just the one entree, with selections of soup or salad beforehand. But she was pleased by it all: grilled lemonfish with crabmeat and two sauces, preceded by a salad.
I began with one of my favorite items from Chef Gunter's playbook, one that he was cooking back at the Versailles in the 1980s. It's crabmeat Herbsaint, a gratin of lump crabmeat sizzled on top of creamed spinach flavored with the namesake liqueur. This was as luscious as ever--a superb dish. But I wonder why they've adopted one of the more mysterious current service gambits: letting broiled dishes splatter all over the inside of the serving dish, and sending it out that way. I understand why this happens for, say, a steak at Ruth's Chris or a dramatic experiment in some little bistro. But in contrast with the very elegant surroundings of Broussard's, it looks like a dirty dish, even though I know very well that it is not. They ought to go back to the old ramekins that could be filled to the top to avoid this issue.
My entree tonight is a signature dish for Broussard's, one going back to the time when Carlos Marcello owned the place in the 1970s. It's a strip sirloin of veal, cooked just like a steak, and served with at least two sauces. The current edition has three: a demi-glace, bearnaise, and a spicy aioli. It's a spectacular dish that hardly anyone else ever serves. I wonder why it's not better known among local diners. (I will try to fix that. This is my job, after all.) Veal sirloin has a unique flavor, and gives you the satisfaction of eating a steak without having to gorge.
Lynn and I have deep, funny, wide-ranging conversations. Unlike most people, she gets all my humor and references, even the corny and obscure. She is one of the many people Mary Ann says I should have married instead of her.
We also had a few glasses of wine. The night was young--we arrived at about six-thirty--and I thought we could add further entertainment to the night with a visit to Café Giovanni. My ulterior motive was to get Lynn to sing a duet with me, accompanied by Chef Duke's opera singers and pianist. Lynn is also a singer, with the Shades of Praise multi-racial gospel group. But she is reluctant to emerge from the safety of a chorus, where mistakes cancel each other out and the music still sounds good.
Home around eleven. Mary Leigh was still on the sofa, watching Friends, and sounding like her sinus issue has become much worse.
Broussard's. French Quarter: 819 Conti. 504-581-3866. Classic Creole.
Barbecue.
Bywater/Downtown: 801 Poland Ave.. 504-949-3232 . Map.
Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-9 p.m.
Very Casual.
MC V
Website
WHY IT'S NOTEWORTHY
As New Orleans continues to discover what real barbecue is about, we've managed to hold onto a few really good purveyors. The Joint, despite its abbreviated menu and minimal surroundings--is one of the city's best. This is barbecue for people who know that a bite should leave crunchy black shreds stuck in your teeth, and that the meat shouldn't stay on the plate when you pick up a rib.
WHY IT'S GOOD
Barbecue is all about slow cooking, smoke, and a great dry rub. All of that conspires to leave an exciting bark on the outside and intense flavor in the inside. They are very aggressive in this matter, and that's what this barbecue lover is looking for.
BACKSTORY
Pete and Jenny Breen, after deciding the the Bywater District was among the most culturally promising parts of town, opened the Joint in 2004. It had already established a reputation for goodness by the time Katrina hit, and when it reopened afterwards was one of those places whose return was much rejoiced in.
DINING ROOM
Nobody goes to a barbecue joint for creature comforts, but even with that in mind the premises come across as--well, they named it The Joint, didn't they? No misleading advertising, that. The neighborhood is interesting, full of century-old houses waiting to be renovated. It's also adjacent to one of the major administrative facilities for the Port of New Orleans.
ESSENTIAL DISHES
St. Louis cut pork spareribs
Pulled pork
Beef brisket
Barbecue chicken
Barbecue chaurice (hot sausage)
Pulled pork sandwich
Beef brisket sandwich
Sausage sandwich
Cole slaw
Potato salad
Baked beans
Macaroni and cheese
Pecan pie
Key lime pie
Peanut butter pie
FOR BEST RESULTS
Buy half again as much as you want and take it home. Barbecue is one of the few cuisines that lends itself to traveling in a car and saving in a refrigerator for a few days.
OPPORTUNITIES FOR IMPROVEMENT
Really, they could clean this place up a bit and make it more comfortable.
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 -3
- Consistency +2
- Service -1
- Value +2
- Attitude -1
- Wine and Bar
- Hipness
- Local Color +1
SPECIAL ATTRIBUTES
- Courtyard or deck dining
- Open Monday lunch and dinner
- Open all afternoon
- Quick, good meal
- Good for children
- Easy, nearby parking
- No reservations
Strawberry Shortcakes
A true shortcake is not the sponge cake that's typically used for this famous old dessert, but something a lot like a drop biscuit. We make these all the time, and it's an essential for our Easter parties.
- 3 cups self-rising flour
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 6 Tbs. butter, softened
- 1 1/2 cups half-and-half
- 2 pints fresh strawberries
- 1 pint whipping cream
- 1/3 cup sugar
Preheat oven to 475 degrees.
1. Measure flour and sugar into a large bowl. Whisk to blend. Cut butter into flour mixture and stir in with a wire whisk until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. A few small lumps are okay.
2. Blend in the half-and-half with light strokes of a kitchen fork. Continue lightly blending until the dough leaves the side of the bowl. Add a little more milk if necessary to work all the dry ingredients into a sticky, thoroughly damp dough.
3. Spoon out the dough with a tablespoon and drop biscuits about four inches in diameter and two inches high on a greased cookie sheet. Leave about in inch between each. Bake 10 to 14 minutes in the preheated 475-degree oven. They're ready when they lightly brown on the top. Don't look for a dark brown; that indicates overbaking.
4. Wash and remove leaves from the strawberries. Slice them top to bottom about 1/4 inch thick.
5. Whip the cream in a chilled metal bowl until soft peaks form. Add the sugar and continue whipping until no grittiness remains.
6. Slice the shortcakes in half. Spoon some whipped cream on the bottom half. Add sliced strawberries until they fall off the sides, and a little more whipped cream.
Makes about twelve shortcakes.
