I LOVE New Orleans, even though our Memorial Day weekend trip there was only my second time to go (Mrs. Chef and I spent our honeymoon in N.O., almost ten years ago - our tenth anniversary is this coming September). When I realized that Chef Jr. would be starting summer vacation the day after Memorial Day, and moreover that Mrs. Chef didn’t have to work that day either, I decided to take a vacation day so we could take a 4-day weekend trip to the Crescent City.
Because I’m the senior editor of a daily newsletter, when I take time off, it doesn’t really mean any less work for me. I already had to complete Tuesday’s newsletter before leaving work Friday; the vacation day meant I had to have Wednesday’s done as well. Worth it, of course, so I busted my hump and got 'em done, as well as a 1500 word article about the Halloween industry.
Mrs. Chef had to work late on Friday, so we didn’t get on the road until after 9:30 pm. The plan was to drive from Dallas until we got to Shreveport (ca. 3 hours) or until I got sleepy, whichever came first. However, when we got to Shreveport I had my second wind, so we decided to keep going. We finally stopped for the night in Alexandria, Louisiana.
The first hotel we tried was full, but directed us to the Howard Johnson’s down the street. There were three people in the lobby (it was 2a.m.)… a woman in her forties, a man about the same who had an indefinable Stuart Smalley quality, and a teenage girl (I’m guessing seventeen) who was the perfect image of Britney Spears without the personal trainer. Yum.
We got the key to our room and trooped upstairs, only to discover that after the room’s previous tenants had checked out, the housekeeping staff hadn’t bothered to make the beds! I called down to the front desk and Stuart came up to lead us to another room. We peeked inside and the beds were made. However, once we turned down the comforters, we discovered that one of them didn’t have a top sheet and neither one had blankets. Sigh…
We called and moved once again. Stuart apologized profusely and said it was his first day as manager in that location, adding, “It looks like I’m going to be spending tomorrow firing people.” His dismay and embarrassment did not, however, extend to comping the room or anything.
So the next morning we got up, had a leisurely breakfast at a nearby Cracker Barrel, and then drove on into New Orleans, arriving a little after three in the afternoon. Our hotel, which had been recommended by Mrs. Chef’s favorite travel agent, Pelham, was called the Pelham Hotel. Hmmmmmmmm…
The hotel itself was very nice, but it was the first renovation in a decaying city block. They told us that valet parking would cost on the order of $20 a day, which I was just too cheap to pay. I got a parking meter spot right in front of the hotel, and since N.O. meters don’t run on Saturday and Sunday, I decided to leave the Green Hornet parked there and save myself forty bucks. (No, it didn’t get broken into or stolen.)
We unpacked, relaxed for a bit, and then walked into the French Quarter. Mrs. Chef had some souvenir shopping to do, so we started going from shop to shop. Zydeco music was blaring from every shop we went into, and Chef Jr. was in HEAVEN - dancing around, looking at all the stuff… he was headed for overload before we’d been in town for an hour. fond grin
As we walked along North Peters street (which runs into Decatur Street), we passed a semi-art gallery that sold mostly posters and small prints but had a few original paintings as well. In the window was an oil painting of the bed-and-breakfast (the Cornstalk Hotel) where we’d spent our honeymoon. We admired it and asked how much it cost; the clerk said $175. Hmmmm, we said. We decided to think about it.
Dinner that night was at Tujague’s, a restaurant that had been recommended by several friends of ours. The food was delicious, and expensive, and not even remotely kid-friendly. We didn’t know this going in, but Tujague’s is one of those prix-fixe places that offers a five-course dinner with choice of four different entrees… no menu. We began with shrimp remoulade. Hmmmm. The shrimp was perfectly done, the salad greens underneath were cold and crisp. The remoulade sauce, however, was MUCH more horse-radishy than usual, and instead of the creole-mustard/dill base I’ve come to expect, it had a sort of sun-dried tomato base. The jury’s still out on whether it was innovative or just plain weird.
Second course was an artichoke and oyster soup. Delicious, but too nouvelle for a place whose reputation is based on classic cuisine. Each bowl held one oyster, one piece of potato, and one-quarter of an artichoke heart, huddling together as if for protection in the middle of a large shallow bowl with its bottom barely covered with perhaps a quarter-inch of admittedly delicious soup. We liked it but thought it would have been better presented in a smaller bowl.
Third course: Tujague’s famous beef brisket, with horseradish sauce… which turned out to be more of the non-standard “remoulade” sauce from the first course. Hmmmmm. The sauce actually worked much better on the brisket than it had on the shrimp and salad. We then received our entrees, followed by bread pudding for dessert. All in all, this place gets the same review that K-Paul’s got ten years ago on our honeymoon: good food, but not good enough to justify the prices… and we probably won’t go back again.
The next day, we had brunch at The Court of Two Sisters. this was a nostalgia thing - we’d gone there on our honeymoon - and it was just as opulent as we remembered it. A jazz trio played out in the courtyard, over which carefully trained wisteria vines ran rampant in a thick green blanket, with just enough dappled sunlight reaching through to illuminate the cast-iron tables and chairs. This place has an incredibly sybaritic buffet with everything from eggs benedict (to order) to boiled crawfish, grillades & grits, usual brunch fare like omelets, french toast, bacon, etc., and a host of artery-clogging desserts - including both chocolate mousse and coconut mousse. We ate hugely and took our sweet time. That afternoon we went on a swamp tour, which was lots of fun… they attract alligators to the tour boats by throwing marshmallows in the water. Which belatedly makes me wonder: what gave the first alligator to try one the idea that marshmallows are good to eat? shrug
Dinnner that night was to have been Johnny’s Po-Boys, but they were closed. Instead, we went to Port of Call, a nautically themed bar that serves (so we had been told) the best burgers in the world. I don’t know if they take the global blue ribbon or not, but they were MIGHTY damn good. I can imagine a cow in line at the slaughterhouse feeling comforted by the knowledge that it was destined to be a Port of Call hamburger.
We overslept on Monday morning and missed breakfast - sigh - so we went to Johnny’s Po-Boys for lunch and wolfed down fried crawfish tails, lettuce, tomato and mayo on fresh, chewy french bread. Pretty good, but not so good that it justifies the condescending way the staff behaves to the patrons. Mrph.
Anyway, we caught the St. Charles streetcar and rode it all the way to the Audubon Zoo, where we toured the swamp exhibit and had a ball before hopping aboard the J.J. Audubon riverboat for a leisurely ride up the Mississippi to the Aquarium of the Americas. The aquarium had a cool exhibit of frogs from around the world, which Chef Jr. dubbed “the ribbit exhibit.” He’s so cool…
We had time to kill before dinner so we went to the IMAX theater and saw “Cyberworld 3D”… WOW. the 3D effects were so amazing that Chef Jr. kept reaching out to try to touch stuff (we were in the front row). I must admit that I wanted to reach out, too.
Finally, it was dinnertime and we went to Mulate’s, outside the French Quarter across from the Convention Center. Mulate’s is the overall winner for Best Meal of the Trip. We had gumbo and grilled alligator to start…then I had a sauteed catfish fillet smothered in crawfish etouffee and Mrs. Chef had blackened shrimp, and we split a piece of key lime pie for dessert. What about Chef Jr., you say? He ordered and ignored some fried catfish tenders in favor of dancing to the music of La Touché, the zydeco band that was playing.
That night I left wife and son at the hotel and told them I was going to go and gamble at Harrah’s (which Mrs. Chef had done the night before); what I really did was go to the art gallery, intending to buy the painting Mrs. Chef had admired and hide it in the trunk. Alas, they were closed, so I went to Harrah’s and gambled for real.
The next day, we were ready to leave and swung by the art gallery. Closed. We had breakfast and then checked again. Closed. We really had to leave town, so we reluctantly left it behind. Mrs. Chef was quiet and I could tell how disappointed she was. Fortunately, we had written down the phone number of the gallery, and we kept trying until they finally opened after noon and bought it over the phone with instructions to ship it to me at work. We got stuck with a $25 shipping charge but saved $19.25 in sales tax, so I think it was okay. It’s due to arrive later this week - I hope it gets here in one piece.
On the way back, I took a wrong turn and we wound up detouring through Nachitoches, which was the most serendipitous wrong turn I ever took. WHAT a beautiful town! (If you’ve seen Steel Magnolias, that movie was filmed in Nachitoches - they’re famous for their Christmas festival of lights.) We may just have to go back.
Rolled back into town late Tuesday night, put Chef Jr. to bed, shoved a load of laundry into the washing machine and collapsed on the couch, happy-tired and glad to be home.
(yeah, like we aren’t anyway)
just kidding. Anyway, I think a British accent would give you a pass to pronounce things however you wish.