Monday, August 23, 2010
1110 Restaurants Open Around Town
Coolinary And Other Special Summer Menus Now In Play
The summer special menus continue to dribble in, even though we're a month into the Coolinary season. (Why restaurants get involved with special promotions but don't post the menus for them is a frustrating mystery.) Chef Anthony Spizale has this three-course lunch deal for $20 every weekday. He must have been very busy the day he composed it:
Chef Spizale Caesar
Hearts of romaine with parmesan grits croutons and a creamy garlic dressing
Black Skillet Roasted Louisiana Catfish
Creole tomatoes and Jazzmen Rice “calas”
Mini Abita Root Beer Float
With Kleinpeter Vanilla Ice Cream
This goes on through the month of September. The best day is Friday, of course, when all the locals stream in.
Rib Room. French Quarter: 621 St. Louis, 504-529-7045./
All 30 Summer Menus So Far
NOMenu has a page listing not only all the summer specials we know about, but all the menus, too. I'm adding new ones daily. That list is now online here.
Friday, August 13. Absinthe At Antoine's, With Friends. I have an invitation to dine tonight from Patti and John Poche. Patti used to sell air time at the radio station, but I didn't get to know her and her husband John (who creates software systems for radio stations) until their son Zack and our son Jude got to know one another at Christian Brothers School and Jesuit. In fact, it's even more indirect than that. We first connected at a party at the home of Mark and Deborah Hymel, whose son also was Jude's classmate. Mark is the guy who introduced me to a funny frozen drink called Ping Pong. It tastes like a nectar soda, and is so luscious that the recipe is in my cookbook. After several more parties with all these people, I began calling John and Patti now and then to go out to dinner. And I miss them, now that John left town for a job on the West Coast a year or so ago.
They left the choice of restaurant to me. The Poches and the Hymels all liked the idea of Antoine's.
Still free of the radio show, I left the Cool Water Ranch at five, with the faint hope that Harold Klein could cut my hair in the basement of the Royal Orleans before dinner. He sometimes stays late on Fridays, but no dice tonight. To kill time, I took a look at the new Antoine's Annex. It's a coffee and pastry shop with ice cream and sandwiches and salads on the restaurant's Royal Street flank, in a space they'd leased for years to a gallery. Looked nice, but the employees seemed desultory and bored. No customers. But who would be walking on the street in this heat?
I've drunk many drinks at Antoine's. But tonight was the first time I had one before dinner in the bar. Mostly this is because there was no bar there until late in 2008. Adding to the auspiciousness of this moment, I asked for an absinthe, served in the traditional way. This only came to mind when I saw the glass reservoir filled with ice and water on the back bar. (Bottom center in the photo.) That's the traditional apparatus for serving absinthe, as is the ornately perforated absinthe "spoon." (An absinthe spoon could serve no standard spoon function.) The bartender spanned a rock glass with the spoon, on top of which was a cube of sugar. The ice water drizzled down in a thin stream, diluting and sweetening the green absinthe in the glass.
Drinking absinthe in the bar at Antoine's! How Old New Orleans can you get? All I need now is an appointment with a prostitute in Storyville.
The Poches and the Hymels fetched up at around seven-thirty. We had another round of drinks in the bar, and opened Topic A: which colleges all our kids have got off to. All but one of them are in universities, and most of them at LSU.
John Poche is full of unlikely but good stories. Watching the television show in which Anthony Bourdain and I had lunch at Antoine's a couple of years ago, John saw a picture of his father in the background. Not only that, but he knew where a framed testimonial from his grandfather was on the wall in Antoine's Dungeon. Antoine's is apparently the official Poche Family restaurant.
The great thing about restaurants whose menus don't change much is that you start anticipating the dinner the minute you make the reservation. I've mentally salivated about this repast for days. We would begin by splitting an entree-size crabmeat au gratin, a dish at which Antoine's excels. The matrix of white sauce and cheese is so light as to be fluffy. (The appetizer version is inexplicably expensive, but the entree splits well four ways at a reasonable price.)
Everybody went along with that plan, along with my suggestion that we divide two of orders of baked oysters (Rockefeller, Bienville, and thermidor). One plate of oysters Foch was in the order for John, who says it's impossible for him to eat here without oysters Foch.
But before any of that arrived, we were treated to a surprise from the chef. Champignons sous cloche--mushrooms under glass. That unique, rich specialty hasn't been on the menu for decades. It doesn't sound like a good idea: squares of toast spread with pate de foie gras, covered with sliced mushrooms cooked in a bechamel with a little sherry. Elegantly decadent. Nice presentation, too: it's served under glass bells, lifted off the plates at the table. (Randy Guste once told me that the reason they don't serve the dish often is that the glass bells don't seem to last more that two or three uses before being broken.)
The entree on my mind was the double lamb chops. Antoine's buys superlative lamb and grills it simply and well. I avoid the mint jelly, of course. That old touch will linger here as long as do customers old enough to remember when all lamb dishes were served with the wiggly green gunk. Bring me bearnaise.
Elsewhere on the table grilled pompano, fried soft shell crabs, and trout amandine entertained. As did a bottle of Grand Cru Chablis, followed by a bottle from my pile that I've been looking at thirstily for the past few months: Sassicaia 1992, a big, well-aged Super Tuscan.
The conversation, naturally enough, kept returning to our brilliant kids. A lot of shared history here. Jude, for example, learned how to drive on an old tractor at the Hymel family's vast sugar cane fields in Convent. He and his buddy Preston Hymel even learned how to use a clutch on that thing.
The Poches say they love Los Angeles, but they still have a house here in New Orleans. I'll get Jude to take them out to dinner sometime.
Antoine's. French Quarter: 713 St. Louis St. 581-4422.
Saturday, August 14. Old-Time Saturday. Megumi. I can sleep late, and had no trouble doing so after last night's well-lubricated dinner. I have no radio show today. No grass to cut. All projects on my list are optional.
I defaulted to the Saturday routine the kids and I relished for over a decade, until they began their own lives. Breakfast at the Courtyard. Grocery store. Bank. Post office. Routines are the key to my small success. They get essential jobs done without my having to worry about them. Go to the dry cleaner every Saturday morning, always have clean clothes. The way I get a very long newsletter out every day--something that impresses a lot of people--is that it's a set-in-stone daily routine. Stephen King, who writes about as much as I do (much better) says the day doesn't seem right unless he's written four or five thousand words.
On the other hand, in Mary Ann's world every plan is subject to change with no advance notice. Anything goes all the time. I think juggling chaos is something she enjoys. It was inevitable that we'd marry one another and drive each other crazy.
It's still raining pretty hard every afternoon. Not a good weekend for a walk--something I wasted to do today. So I knuckled down and taught myself how to build a Joomla website. (Those who don't know what that means will not care; those who do, know more about it than I can tell.) I must say I was astonished how easy it is proving to be, although I have a long way to go before it results in the vastly-improved website I'm aiming for.
So as not to lose momentum, I went for a simple supper. Sushi sounded good. I broke my own advice by getting it at the newly-opened Megumi in Covington. I thought this would be a small risk because the original Megumi in Mandeville is excellent. But to play it safe I ordered chirashi sushi. The Mandeville Megumi's version of that is the best I've had anywhere. "Chirashi" means "scattered." The fish, instead of being wrapped around a knob of sushi rice piece by piece, is all placed atop a bed of rice. Here the fish was in one plate, and the rice in another. No problem with that, but there was a problem. Most of the fish (notably the tuna) had a texture that suggested to me that it had been defrosted too quickly. A sort of squishy texture. And too cold. Disappointing.
That was about enough for dinner, but I wanted a little something hot--not least because the dining room was freezing. An order of gyoza left a better impression than the sushi: well-made, tender dumplings with a nice pepper level in the stuffing.
I will write this dinner off to my having come too soon. (They didn't even have a liquor license yet. No beer.) The service staff is amateurish. But the menu is intriguing. Like many Asian restaurants these days, Megumi doesn't stick entirely with its main cuisine. They have Vietnamese pho, Korean grilled meats, and Chinese dim sum (just a little) on the menu. I'll wait six months before I return. As I should have done today. I hope it flourishes. This location has not been kind to its several previous tenants--most recently Hog Heaven, which went to its namesake place after less than a year.
Back at the computer, I played with code until my eyes started burning, at about midnight. Then another nice night's sleep in the still, quiet house. Nobody upstairs to wake me up with a toilet flush that cascades down in a pipe two feet from my pillow.
Megumi. Covington: 1211 Village Walk. 985-893-0406.
Click here for the Dining Diary entry before the ones above.
Click here for an index to the last five years of entries.
Sandwiches. Platters.
Metairie: 6943 Saints Dr. 504-734-0922. Map.
Breakfast and lunch Monday-Saturday.
Very Casual.
AE MC V
WHY IT'S NOTEWORTHY
Mano's is a neighborhood cafe and poor boy shop you won't know about unless you know about it. It's adjacent to Mike Miley Field and the busy nexus that is the intersection of Airline and David Drive, all of which brings in people looking for a fast, inexpensive lunch with more character than fast food. They do a heavy blue-collar business, so it's impossible to leave here hungry. Mano's opens for breakfast daily with a very basic menu.
WHY IT'S GOOD
The menu follows a familiar formula. You find a long list of poor boy sandwiches, including one outstanding specialty: veal parmesan, crusty and moistened with red sauce and melted cheese. And every day brings a half-dozen or so daily specials. As in red beans on Monday. . . and you know the rest. The food here is, near as I can tell, cooked in house and reasonably good. Best in Metairie for this menu? No. Best in this part of Metairie? Probably.
BACKSTORY
Mano's opened in 1992, right around the time when the New Orleans Saints moved their training facility nearby. Reports of Saints players eating here are too numerous to ignore.
DINING ROOM
The restaurant is located on Saints Drive at David Drive. The menu sports not one but three fleurs-de-lis. Can you guess the dominant decor theme?
ESSENTIAL DISHES
Poor boy sandwiches:
Veal parmesan
Roast beef
Turkey breast
Veal cutlet
Smoked sausage
Hot sausage
Bacon, lettuce, and tomato
Hot dog with chili
Meatball
Club
Chicken salad
Tuna salad
Chicken tender
Ham and cheese
Country fried steak
BBQ beef
Hamburger
Cheeseburger
Grilled cheese
French fry
Shrimp
Oyster
Fish
Daily plate specials
Monday:
Red beans and rice with pork chops, hot or smoked sausage
meatballs, veal parmesan, or chicken parmesan with spaghetti
Tuesday:
Fried chicken
Hamburger steak
Liver and onions
Wednesday:
Stuffed bell pepper with lima beans
Veal cutlet
Country fried steak
Thursday:
Grilled chicken breast with dressing
Meatloaf with baked macaroni
Red beans and rice with hot or smoked sausage
Friday:
Fried fish, shrimp, oyster, or combo platter
Veal cutlet
FOR BEST RESULTS
Unless you're doing heavy work, you will be able to make two meals out of any of the poor boys here, despite prices that might suggest small portions. Dishes like liver and onions and country-fried steak should be considered as elements of atmosphere rather than serious menu staples.
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
- Value +2
- Attitude +1
- Wine and Bar
- Hipness
- Local Color +1
SPECIAL ATTRIBUTES
- Open Monday lunch
- Unusually large servings
- Quick, good meal
- Easy, nearby parking
Turkey Poulette
Sliced turkey with a hot sauce, cheese and bacon--this is an old luncheon favorite that is now nearly extinct. And perhaps it should be. However, people who remember it fondly as a standard at the Roosevelt Hotel might not think so--even if it's been forty years since the last time they tried it. It's just one of those dishes. In modern times, the Peppermill in Metairie has been about the only restaurant even attempting to keep turkey poulette alive. The sauce that holds all the pieces together is a classic French sauce, most commonly used for chicken. (Hence the name.) But ti's not much used even in France anymore
- Sauce:
- 1/2 stick butter
- 3 Tbs. flour
- 1 cup warm whole milk
- 1 cup sliced fresh white mushrooms
- 1 oz. dry sherry
- 1/8 tsp. white pepper
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 2/3 cup shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
- 2 onion rolls
- 8 large slices roast turkey breast, about 1/8 inch thick
- 8 slices bacon. fried crisp
- 1/4 cup green onions, snipped thin
Preheat the broiler to 450 degrees.
1. Melt the butter in a small saucepan and stir in the flour to make a blond roux. When the roux just begins to color, lower the heat to the lowest setting and add the warm milk. Whisk until the mixture pulls away from the side of the pan.
2. Add the mushrooms, sherry, white pepper, and salt. Stir until the sherry disappears. Simmer, stirring every now and then, until the mushrooms are soft. Remove the sauce from the heat.
3. Slice the onion rolls from top to bottom to make slices about a half-inch thick. Toast them until medium brown. Divide the slices on four plates.
4. Top the onion roll toasts with two slices per plate of the turkey. Divide the sauce over the turkey. Top each plate with two slices of bacon and a fourth of the grated Cheddar.
5. Put the plates under the broiler until the cheese melts and the sauce bubbles. Remove the hot plates to liner plates. Garnish the turkey poulettes with green onions and serve.
Serves four.
