Tessie's Place
116 N Woodlawn Ave, Metairie, LA 70001, USA
Metairie 2: Orleans Line To Houma Blvd
Anecdotes & Analysis
"We're going to the barroom," said the female of the couple that just finished eating dinner while I was just beginning mine at Tessie's Place. She laughed about that, and the waitress laughed back. As if they were doing something naughty. People of a certain age always laugh when they talk about having a drink.<br /> <br /> Tessie's walls are nearly 100 percent covered with fake walnut paneling--the restaurant interior decoration rage of the 1960s. All the other furnishings fit in perfectly with the wall covering. So does the menu. It's far longer than you find these days, with almost everything you can imagine such a restaurant's serving. It's a long time since I saw a menu with a dozen salads (including one of the last still called a "wop salad"), ten soups, and four kinds of beans-and-rice.
Backstory
Tessie's is the reincarnation of a 1940s Jefferson Highway roadhouse called the Club 90, which had a long-standing record of good poor boys and fried chicken when it closed in the 1970s. The standards of that era are all still in place. This has downsides (a lack of vivid freshness) as well as upsides (some great lost flavors are here).
Dining Room
Well hidden on a side street off Airline Highway (Woodlawn is a block city side of Clearview), Tessie's dining room looks like any of a hundred restaurants I recall from the 1960s. Most of those are either gone or renovated. Tessie's remains--without irony or self-consciousness--a time machine to that era. Even the music could have been heard in the 1950s.
Why It's Essential
A throwback to the neighborhood restaurants of at least fifty years ago, Tessie's serves all the local favorites from a menu so extensive it's almost laughable. You can get not just red beans any day but white beans, butterbeans, or blackeye peas. Those are all good, but the best shot is the fried chicken, followed closely by the roast beef poor boy. Enormous portions are also part of the authenticity.
Why It's Good
Here's a restaurant full of dishes hardly anyplace else serves anymore, particularly among the daily specials. When's the last time you had a hamburger steak or a bowl of chili in a restaurant? The offerings are a mix of neighborhood Creole dishes with Italian food, with sandwiches good enough to make the restaurant's reputation on their own.
Most Interesting Dishes
<em><strong>Starters</strong></em><br /> Chicken breast tenders<br /> Jumbo chicken wings<br /> »Fried eggplant sticks<br /> Eggplant stuffing<br /> »Stuffed artichokes<br /> Broccoli au gratin<br /> »Fried onion rings<br /> Stuffed mushrooms<br /> Shrimp cocktail or remoulade<br /> Spinach-artichoke dip<br /> Fried chicken livers<br /> <em><strong>Salads</strong></em><br /> Tossed or Caesar salad (options: shrimp or grilled chicken)<br /> »Combination salad<br /> Chef salad<br /> Cole slaw<br /> Potato salad<br /> »Wop salad<br /> Boiled shrimp salad<br /> Lettuce and tomato salad<br /> Diced chicken salad<br /> »Roasted garlic chicken salad<br /> Iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, bell pepper, celery, red onions, Monterey jack cheese, black olives, garlic balsamic vinaigrette<br /> <em><strong>Soups</strong></em><br /> Turkey sausage gumbo<br /> »Vegetable soup<br /> Split pea soup<br /> Shrimp Creole<br /> French onion soup<br /> Tomato-basil soup<br /> »Seafood gumbo<br /> Chicken noodle soup<br /> Crawfish etouffee<br /> »Chili<br /> <em><strong>Entrees</strong></em><br /> <em>Beans served with rice and smoked sausage, grilled pork chop or fried catfish</em><br /> »Red beans<br /> »Butter beans<br /> »White beans<br /> »Black-eyed peas<br /> »Beef stew<br /> Barbecue ribs<br /> »Hamburger steak<br /> Grilled pork chop<br /> Boneless pork chop<br /> »Stuffed pork chop<br /> »Corned beef and cabbage<br /> »Meatballs and spaghetti<br /> »Italian sausage and spaghetti<br /> Chicken breast parmigiana with spaghetti<br /> Veal, chicken or eggplant parmigiana with spaghetti<br /> Pasta Alfredo (options: grilled shrimp, chicken or catfish)<br /> »Fried chicken, half or quarter<br /> Fried chicken livers, gravy and onions<br /> Grilled chicken breast, onions and mushrooms<br /> »Fried shrimp, catfish, stuffed crab, oyster or combination platters<br /> Stuffed shrimp<br /> »Shrimp bordelaise with spaghetti<br /> »Broiled redfish<br /> Grilled salmon, garlic butter<br /> »Broiled flounder, crabmeat stuffing<br /> Broiled tilapia<br /> Shrimp parmigiana<br /> Stuffed catfish<br /> »Thin-cut catfish<br /> <em><strong>Sandwiches</strong></em><br /> »Ham and cheese<br /> »Ham<br /> »Fried catfish, shrimp, or oyster<br /> Club (and variations)<br /> Hamburger<br /> »Roast beef<br /> Barbecue beef<br /> »Corned beef<br /> Chicken fried steak<br /> Meatball<br /> »Smoked, Italian or hot sausage<br /> Diced chicken salad<br /> Grilled chicken breast<br /> <em><strong>Desserts</strong></em><br /> »Bread pudding<br /> Apple Pie<br /> Cheesecake<br /> »Peach Cobbler <br />
Deficiencies
They're good at frying, but it needs to be more religiously prepared to order, in no hurry.
For Best Results
Wait as long as you need to for the fried chicken. Get (and split) a side order of beans with that.
Bonus Ratings
1
Attitude
1
Local Color
1
Service
2
Value