For as long as she lived, a dear friend of Tom’s hosted us at Brennan’s for birthdays. We have many happy memories there and I remember exactly where we sat.
That table, and that Brennan’s, is long gone, replaced by a much more expensive and glamorous restaurant. The black chefs who rose up from dishwasher have been replaced by fancy culinary grads bending all the rules. I liked the “new” Brennan’s well enough in the days when Slade Rushing upended everything, but he’s been in London since right before COVID. He was replaced by his sous, who is also gone and replaced by his female sous.
Much has been made of the female chef thing, but it has no bearing on anything to me. That’s for the media to gush about.
I returned to Brennan’s for dinner and wanted to get the $80 tasting menu. I love birthdays and anniversaries and I wanted to participate. Until I looked at the menu, and realized I only wanted to eat the dessert, and only because I loved the IG video about it.
The special of the evening was a table side Steak Diane, and I probably should have opted for that. Instead I went through the menu with my process of elimination method, choosing crab claws and the chicken entree, something I never do. When I was told the chicken wasn’t available I went with the Stuffed Gulf Fish. As usual, that didn’t mean what I thought, though the word “mousseline” in the description told the story. I just didn’t listen. I am not opposed to a mousseline in principle, but I wasn’t crazy about this one. But I get ahead of myself.
I added a seafood gumbo to this collection, as well as the dirty rice side. The Parker House rolls that replaced the classic New Orleans bread in the white bag emblazoned with the restaurant’s logo were different than I remembered them. When Slade Rushing pulled this practice and replaced it with the Parker House Rolls, I liked them well enough. If I had to get used to this change that I consider blasphemy, these needed to be as good as they were. And they were very good. The ones I had on this visit were not that good, but they were good enough.
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The seafood gumbo was a pretty dish with a lot of mostly crawfish. It was intensely flavored with a seafood stock and a lot of spice. This too, was good enough but not memorable.
I was shocked by the crab claws that came next. It was unclear to me by the menu description if these were cold or hot. The word vinaigrette threw me. I assumed they would be cold from just that word. But these were warm, and weird. Weird in every way. The claws themselves were tough, which is something I have never encountered with crab claws. It was hard to pull them from the cartilage. Maybe cooking them in a vinaigrette made this way? Since I’ve never seen a warm vinaigrette, maybe that was the problem. The top was generously covered with fresh dill, itself a strong flavor. Odd.
I was so taken aback by these crab claws that I was no longer looking forward to the next dish. The dish was pretty, a tallish rectangle of Drum which was crusted on top and blanketed by green and brown bits of things. The shrimp stuffing was a mousseline that has that soft consistency punctuated by chunks of shrimp, which only serves to remind me I was eating puréed shrimp. The sauce underneath was nice, and it was fine, but for $40 I want to be happy. The haricot verts on the top were chopped, further reducing the already limited appeal of green beans. The dish was finished with the elite almond known as Marcona, and they were roasted brown, providing substantial crunch. In my opinion, Marcona almonds are sublime, and should not just be a part of a dish. They deserve top billing.
I believe that in fancy restaurants pricey ingredients add to the cache of a dish, and thereby its cost. I don’t need truffles, and definitely not truffle oil. There is way too much “truffling” going on out there. Brennan’s has some of the most highly produced IG videos out there, and the ones celebrating their new female chef are riveting. A particular one about their "Snickers" dessert made me have to try it. I never order dessert, but this time I went for the “Snickers.• It was as billed, a housemade Snickers bar, though the entirety of it was much smaller than I expected, but exactly like the candy bar, with a dollop of whipped cream on top.
Throughout this meal I chatted with table mates that weren’t exactly table mates, but the tables were so close they may as well have been. It was a couple from Dallas who ordered the $80 anniversary prix fixe. As the evening progressed they discussed each course and I concluded that they were underwhelmed by their experience at this storied restaurant. I finally asked how they liked it and both shrugged. “It was fine,” which is always translated in my mind as “Meh.” And despite all the hoopla about the new female chef, “meh” is how I would describe everything I have had at Brennan’s since Slade Rushing left. And that’s too bad.
