Thursday, January 5, 2017.
The Expansion Of Drago's. Flame on!
I am back in the WWWL studio for the first time this week, now that the engineers have the failed electronic gizmo replaced. From what I've heard, I'll bet it had something to do with that intense two days of thunderstorms that we went through over the last weekend.
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Tommy Cvitanovich.[/caption]
After several days of trying to meet there, after the show Mary Ann and I finally rendezvous at Drago's. It is worth the wait. Drago's new dining room is magnificent, a bifurcated room the size of a movie theater, and with ceilings nearly as tall. A sort of peninsula separates the dining rooms into halves. That's where the action is for the oyster shuckers and the oyster grillers. The latter create blasts of fire and smoke. The exhaust fans grab the vapors long enough to keep the flames, heat and smoke from impinging on the tables. However, the aroma of grilling oysters is still pervasive. One gets a delicious whiff of it many blocks away from the restaurant.
Tommy Cvitanovich--Drago's son and the major domo of the original Drago's in Metairie--joined us at the table to give us a rundown of the new premises. It appear to have been accomplished by knocking out the back wall and extending the tables and chairs about twice as far as the old dining room did.
Tommy tells me that only a few more tables were added, and that the Char-Broiled Oyster Peninsula and the open space around it create a dramatic illusion of spaciousness.
Oysters inevitably show up at our table. Mary Ann takes a few, and so does our travel agent Debbie Himbert, who will attempt to talk business during the evening. That leaves me with about a half-dozen char-broiled oysters. That's enough for me to form an opinion I have voiced before: although it seems every seafood place in the city grills oysters in the Drago style, the Drago originals still stand apart. These are everything I would ever hope for.
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Oyster-Licious.[/caption]
The most often-asked at Drago's in Metairie is, "How is Drago doing?" The answer is that he is ninety-four, and is in the condition of one that age. "The lesson I learned from my mother and father is the great love that she has for him. The kind of care that she gives him takes up most of her time and energy. And she still works the front desk every day, too."
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Grilled sheepsead fish at Drago's.[/caption]
Klara Cvitanovich does indeed. It isn't until things slow down for the evening that she sits down at our table, where she, Debbie, and Mary Ann keep a colloquy going. I can't so much as make a simple point without the girls' taking over right away.
Tommy sends out a few new items from the kitchen. One of these is an appetizer called "Oyster-Licious." It's the kind of thing you'd find in course number three of a big wine dinner. It's friend oysters in a sweet-heat kind of sauce. A couple of bites and one is both satisfied at the taste level and amused in the innovative department. We have a few other dishes with similar success. But whenever I have a dish like this at Drago's, I find myself thinking that another dozen char-broiled would always beat out the creative stuff.
Tommy and I appear to have lost about the same amount of weight during the past few years. That's what the girls all say, anyway. The number of children belonging to Tommy and his brother Gerry (who has become the coroner of Jefferson Parish) asks the question, "Which if any of these high-school-to-college-age young people will become involved with the restaurant." Some can't wait, some won't ever, says Tommy.
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Grilled corn on the cob: a dish in development.[/caption]
The opens a conversation about the lack of a strong four-year, academically sound college program for people who want to do hospitality as a career. Tommy is very active in matters like that, and he seems to be somewhere between hopeful and frustrated.
Although I was sitting next to Debbie all night, the question of our next Eat Club cruise doesn't get off the ground. We're still looking at a British Isles two-week cruise, or maybe a river cruise in Europe. But we're not getting any closer to either of those, and time is running out.
Drago's.. Metairie: 3232 N Arnoult Rd. 504-888-9254.
