[title type="h5"]Saturday, May 16, 2015.
Blue Line Breakfast. Ideal Market.[/title]
Mary Ann wants to keep up her presence on the Saturday radio show. (Except, of course, when she is in Germany.) So she meets up with me in Metairie, where the program is on remote broadcast from the new Ideal Market.
But, first, we have breakfast, in a café that has captured a lot of interest from people who like neighborhood cafes. After three years in which he brought the food at Ye Olde College Inn to the highest point I have witnessed in its history, Chef Brad McGehee left to open his own breakfast and lunch shop on Metairie Road. The name "Blue Line Sandwich Company" is a reference to a streetcar line that once ran on Metairie Road as an adjunct to the Napoleon Avenue streetcar. That's so obscure that I've never heard of it, and I am a bus-and-streetcar geek.
Most of what I've heard about the Blue Line is that 1) it's in the space where the Great Wall Chinese restaurant was for many years and b) the Blue Line is packed all the time. The latter was not true this Saturday morning. Only about a third of the tables were occupied. This meant that the seating scheme was confusing. Sometimes you place your order at the end of the bar, and sometimes they have full table service. Whichever, the service is not very good, perhaps by management rules. For example, coffee and tea are served without saucers, which doesn't work for tea at all.
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Corned beef hash and eggs at Blue Line.[/caption]
We were saved from this by Chef Brad, who has been on the radio show with me, and whose achievements at Ye Olde were worth my noting in reviews. He came by and gave us a rundown on the menu, recommending in particular the house-made corned beef hash and eggs.
Which I order. It is a large plate of food, topped with lightly-fried eggs. I don't often have my eggs prepared that way, but this was flawless in all of its elements. And so amply served that I would not need another full meal this day.
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Eggs with cochon de lait and redeye biscuit gravy.[/caption]
Mary Ann also has something good and distinctive. It's a giant biscuit filled with cochon de lait, with a sausage red-eye cream gravy. She says it's not exactly what she had in mind, but better than she expected.
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Apple pie.[/caption]
Brad brings us a slice of apple pie, as if we need something more to eat. It's from his dinner menu, but is very good in the morning, too.
One never knows what will come next in the supermarket business. Who would have guessed that a food store with the inventory of Whole Foods would be so eagerly patronized. Or the larger Rouse's stores. I was a consultant for about fifteen years to the National/Canal Villere/Real Superstore chain, which once was mighty. In those days, it was all about adding another tenth of a percent to the profitability of a business in which a three percent total return on investment was considered a grand slam. Because such stores wouldn't dream of doing what Fresh Market does, they're gone.
At this moment, Ideal Market seems poised to grab a lot of customer base. It's a food market the size of a Walgreens, specializing in Latin American food specialties. While an unsuspecting customer can buy most of his weekly grocery shopping at the Ideal, the main appeal is to those who are intrigued by the wide range of unfamiliar meats, vegetables, herbs, breads, and dry groceries. In this era, Ethnic = Gourmet.
Five Ideal Markets are scattered around town. This new one, on the corner of Airline Highway and Clearview, is in brightly repainted former Walgreens. The spaces are a little tight, but that seems to add authenticity to the marketing.
I was certainly able to find a lot to talk about during our three-hour radio show. The butcher shop in particular was filled with variety meats. Even the familiar steaks and roasts are cut in a somewhat different way. Or marinated in concoctions that not only heighten the flavors but the colors, too. The busiest station seemed to be the open wood-burning grill at which a cook sears fajitas. Right behind him is a vertical rotisserie on whose spindle are slices of beef. Sort of like the Middle-Eastern beef specialty called shawarma.
Marco Arroyo, the general manager of all the local Ideals (there are more still in Baton Rouge), gives me a stack of twenty-five-dollar gift certificates to give away. They proved that someone actually does listen to my Saturday show. We played a secret-word game, using hispanic words like "guacamole" and "guanabana." Each new contest brought winners into the store within seconds--and I am not exaggerating. The manager and his advertising guy were very impressed by this. I have a feeling this will not be our last remote from Ideal.
The manager pressed me to take some stuff home. I get a nice slab of fajitas meat (which looked and was great) and a half-gallon of menudo. I am the only one in our house who will eat that wonderful Mexican tripe stew. I need no other supper. This stuff is great.
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[title type="h5"]Sunday, May 17, 2015.
Brunch @ Annadele's Plantation. [/title]
Probably because we had no supper last night, Mary Ann and I have brunch this morning. We go to a restaurant I've not been to lately: Annadele's Plantation, the closest brunch restaurant to the Cool Water Ranch. The dining room is not very busy, but the staff is. They have two weddings today, one of them for well over 200 people. This is a great place for nuptials, especially at this time of year. The flowers are coming up, the trees are fully green, and the the antique buildings with their big dining rooms are decidedly local in design. They date back to the times when Covington was just a railroad station and a marketplace for cattle.
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Crawfish risotto.[/caption]
Mary Ann starts with a very rich, large (it could have been served as an entree), and scrumptious (to use MA's exact word) risotto of crawfish. We both like it and pack it away. The soup of the day, a chicken and tortilla soup with no noticeable tomato, is in too small a coffee cup to be served without disappointment. But my bites of the big risotto fill the gap.
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Soft-shell crab and beans.[/caption]
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Poached eggs with potatoes and crabmeat.[/caption]
Her entree is a nice-looking fried soft shell crab with green beans and a buttery sauce. Mine is a pair of poached eggs that really stand up proudly, with crabmeat, mushrooms, and creamed spinach. Exactly what I am in the mood for.
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Lost bread or bread pudding?[/caption]
But my favorite part of this brunch is a dessert I deconstruct from an unlikely entree: lost bread with pecans and syrup and a side of smoked sausage. I asked for this sans the sausage, which transforms it into a bread pudding. Which is wonderful.
We are no sooner back home than it starts raining, and not long after that than a hailstone-riddled, frog-strangling deluge dumps it load. So much for taking a nice hour-long walk, let alone cutting the grass.
Mary Leigh, who for a change has no big baking assignments, makes a batch of brownies. She get the recipe from a little pastry shop where she worked for awhile. She says that the chocolate component could hardly be richer, but the texture--imagine a crunchy-skinned soufflee--makes it seem light. I will wheedle this recipe from her sooner or later.
[title type="h5"]Annadele Plantation. Covington: 71518 Chestnut St. 985-809-7669. [/title]
