Thursday, July 20, 2017. Manale's Surrounded By Water.
The Garden District doesn't flood often, but whenever it does, it becomes harder to get around the neighborhood (and Center City and the Irish Channel) than seems possible. But it is possible, and then some. The last time I had to deal with this, about a year ago, I came very close to going perhaps as much as a foot and a half deep. I always heard that the oldest parts of town were the ones unlikely to flood.
Today's deluge didn't begin until I was about two hours into the radio show. Before the program began, the sun was shining. The climate gets stranger every day.
The route I took to avoid the lakes and lagoons all but pointed directly at Pascal's Manale. Mary Ann had already given me the lecture as to her not wanting to eat with me, because then she would have to eat. (Read that again if you want.) It was a solo dinner that began with a gin and tonic (overpoured, as they always are at Manale's). I took one sip and then my phone rang. It was Mary Leigh, who hinted that she'd be open to joining me for dinner. I never get tired of dining with my beautiful daughter, and she headed over to join me.
"How about that flooding?" is my first bit of conversation.
"What flooding?" she said. That's Uptown, all right. It fills up, discharges the tides into Broadmoor, and becomes dry.
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Tournedos with bearnaise at Pascal's Manale.[/caption]
Topic A: She has decided to join MA on a trip to England and Ireland. There is no itinerary: MA will get a car and they will drive for days on the wrong side of the road until they see all the castles and locations of movies and television shows. They will do this. . .next week? Yes.
This is the reason I am not going. I require knowing where I will spend the night tonight, where and when dinner will be, and what flights we will take to get home. MA improvises almost all of that. She flies on standby. Dinner? Why should we waste time on that? That plan/no plan disagreement between my wife and me is what drives the other one nuts. I wish her well and will cover the home front.
ML shows up at Manale's a half-hour after we make contact. No problem. I have some raw oysters followed by some pompano with crabmeat. ML has fettuccine Alfredo, followed by a wedge salad. And with Charlie's Steak House just a block away!
Everything at Pascal's Manale continues to be stylistically old hat. But it's a good old hat. ML says that she likes the place more every time she dines with me there.
Pascal's Manale. Uptown: 1838 Napoleon Ave. 504-895-4877.
