True confession: I get obsessed about things sometimes, and I'm obsessively curious about something that strikes my fancy. No one who listens to The Food Show is surprised by that statement. One of those fixations is daube and spaghetti. Occasionally, we had daube and spaghetti in my home of origin, and it was always something I loved to eat. My mother made it with a chuck roast.
Many years went by before I ever saw it in a restaurant, but lately, I see it every now and then. It never seems to be there when I am there. Usually, it’s a special on a day I’m not there, or someone tells me on The Food Show that they've had it somewhere.
So when I saw it again on IG on a day I could go, we went to Gendusa’s in Kenner, which offers Daube and Spaghetti each Sunday as a special. Gendusa’s also happens to be one of the few places in town stuffing their own artichokes, another thing I’m always on the hunt for.
The last time we went to Gendusa’s we sat in the little room in the very front, but even though Tom was clearly not a candidate for a long walk, the hostess wouldn't hear of us sitting there, indicating that the dining room was at the end of a long walk down a dark hall.
The dining room is very cute, featuring a handpainted mural of the old original restaurant half a block away that burned down years ago. It’s a charming space, except for the presence of televisions. Big ones. We're used to seeing these all over now, but they are usually broadcasting sports. One of the televisions over the bar had a movie on. It was one of my favorites, My Cousin Vinny.
When we sat down I asked the waitress to please bring some bread immediately, and she brought an enormous pile of garlic bread. I didn't inspect it but it didn’t seem to be butter.
The stuffed artichoke arrived and I remembered the last one we had here as better. It was so overstuffed I was immediately suspicious that it was mostly breading, which it was, There was a slight garlic flavor but not much else. The artichoke itself was very tender and nice to eat.
We also ordered spin dip, just because. It came with thickish crostini and was very rich. There was goat cheese in it, which is always present when the spin dip is over-the-top rich, as this was.
We ordered an Italian salad and then the waitress asked me what kind of dressings we wanted with the salads that came with the entrees. I canceled the salad and we each got the Italian salad as part of the meal. She could have not told us, but I like it when a server is looking out for us.
These salads were not especially good but they were good enough. They were large and really generous with salami and cheese and artichoke pieces. For a free salad, I thought this was something.
I ordered Tuna for Tom and made the mistake of ordering it medium. It was well overcooked even for me. But it was a nice piece of fish and came with a beautiful medley of vegetables. Thinly sliced squash and zucchini were pan-sauteed in brown butter with big sliced mushrooms. These vegetables were outstanding. It's rare for me to be excited about vegetables that come with an entree, but I could have eaten just this and been well satisfied.
The daube that we went for was another very generous portion. Served over angel hair pasta, this was enough for two meals. The red sauce was thick and cooked all day but wasn’t especially sweet. It was a little sweet, but not offensively so. The brisket was a stringy debris. Most places doing daube seem to be doing it with brisket, but I think it’s too stringy. Chuck roast is better, to my taste at least.
I saw a board with the word cannoli on it, so I asked if they had cannoli and if it was from Angelo Brocato's, since a lot of Italian restaurants around town use their desserts. Tom loves the cannoli from Brocato’s, so I was a little disappointed when she said they make it in-house. I was also impressed. They filled one quickly and brought it to the table.
It was pretty, but when I tried to cut it I couldn't believe how hard the shell was. But it was very good and hit the sweet spot for Tom.
All of this was good food but ordinary. It is also insanely cheap. The cute dining room was full of area residents enjoying a nice meal. Its long-standing success proves that there is something for everyone. Not every place has to be fancy and expensive. Sometimes you just want to eat.
