In contrast to yesterday's featureless agenda, we kept ourselves very busy today. The Round Table radio show was visited by Trey Lanaux, representing the third or fourth generation of the family that owns Langenstein's Supermarkets. That's a very busy place this time of year, its deli in particular. It cooks a vast supply of holiday specialties along the lines of daube glacee, turkeys and ducks, and the occasional stuffed veal pocket. Trey says they're down to selling about one veal pocket per year. But people are always calling me about it. I think it's one of those dishes that people would prefer to remember than to eat.
Also with us was Michelle Spansel, who owns a fun kitchen and dining room store called Roux Royale on Royal at Toulouse. She had a bunch of Christmas items, the most intriguing of which were little cloth sacks of what looked like coal, but were really licorice-flavored candies. She also brought a wine glass whose bottom, stem half was a wine bottle. So one could say he drank a glass of wine, after imbibing in fact an entire bottle. The laugh would probably be better than the wine.
Mark Ernst came from the Roosevelt to talk about what was happening during the holidays in that classic hotel and its very Yule-look lobby. But the big development this year is the reopening, after some fifty years absence, of the Fountain Lounge. This is the venue for the Roosevelt's Reveillon dinners. The menu looks good. But I can't get off my mind the fact that this space, during its many decades as the Sazerac Restaurant, was the pioneer of the kind of dinners that presaged the modern Reveillon program.
I finally have been granted a new (but well used) computer for my office. Mr. Andy, who takes care of all our computer issues, said that getting the data out of my old unit--it crashed ten days ago--was unlikely. But at least I can get some work done now in that long gap between the end of my show and the beginning of dinner.
[caption id="attachment_40225" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Dinin groom at Impastato Cellars.[/caption]
Not much work, however. Mary Ann called with the idea of having dinner with her and Mary Leigh at the new Impastato Cellars in Madisonville. The Marys were its first customers when it opened a few months ago, but I haven't dined there yet. The owners are the daughter of Joe Impastato (he of the restaurant behind the Morning Call in Metairie) and her husband.
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Two soft-shell crabs with crabmeat.[/caption]
It's a great-looking place, largely constructed of big cypress boards and beams claimed from plantation demolitions. It has a rustic look--perfect for a restaurant surrounded by trees and wetlands, as this one it.
The menu is more or less the same as the one at Impastato's in Metairie. Pasta combinations of angel hair with spicy red sauce and fettuccine Alfredo began the meal. The girls stuck with salads and soft-shell crabs with crabmeat and shrimp. It came out bubbling: nice start.
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Pork spiedini at Impastato Cellars.[/caption]
On my side of the table was pork spiedini, made with thick slices of pork loin wrapped around a bread-crumb-and-herb stuffing with a few layers of ham. Very Sicilian and very good.
I knew it would be. This is one of several dishes that Joe's brother Sal makes in large amounts at his Lacombe restaurant Sal & Judy's. He sells it to Joe and, now, to Impastato Cellars.
The "cellars" part of the name is not an imposture. They really do have a well-stocked, mostly Italian wine department. You can buy a bottle from it and take it to your table for only slightly above retail. (Which is typically half or less than the typical restaurant wine price.)
As good as this place looks, they made one goof in the design. A Coke dispenser is right in the middle of the dining room. That would be okay for a poor boy shop, but this place has much more class.
It was a cold night, but we decided to buy a Christmas tree anyway. As we have every year for at least the past fifteen, we bought the Tannenbaum from an old guy named Red. He has a lot just off the highway in Claiborne Hill, at the turnoff to downtown Covington. You have to know he's there to find him, but he seems to do a good business. He's lasted so long here that he ought to change his tree lot's name to White's.
It's a long-standing tradition in our family that Mary Leigh has the last word as to which tree we will buy. It's been that way since she was a little girl. She seemed much surer of her decisions back then. Now she's asking other opinions and hedging. It could be that she knows we're going to go along with her choice and feels a little guilty about it. She also has a sympathy for trees that are generally nice-looking, but have some glaring defect. Almost all of our trees had a problem, but it makes us all happy to treat them as if they were headed to a much more auspicious spot than the front room of the Cool Water Ranch House.
Red's Christmas Trees gives away coffee and little candy canes to all comers. It's what brings me back every year. Silly little thing like that.
[title type="h5"]Impastato Cellars. Madisonville: 240 Highway 22 E. 985-845-4445.[/title]
Written by Tom Fitzmorris December 10, 2013 02:34 in
