Friday, January 6, 2017.
Over The Top At DiCristina's. In The Rain.
DiCristina's in Covington is ever identified with its family (but not business) connection with Rocky & Carlo's in Chalmette. A lot of the food has counterparts at Rocky's, but DiCristina's has a wider range and a bit more delicacy--neither of which is sine qua non in Chalmette.
The dish that comes to mind when Rocky's does is its famous macaroni and cheese, almost certainly the best the the entire area. My wife Mary Ann likes to parade out my feeling that mac 'n' cheese is not one of the great victories in culinary history. MA says this shows me for the food snob I am.
I reject this thesis, and offer as evidence these very words. On my way to DiCristina's for lunch today--on a rainy and cold day, yet--I was thinking about what I might eat there. A fuzz-focus image formed of a dish with the creaminess of fettuccine alfredo, with perhaps a light application of tomato sauce, and little on the way of protein. No veal, chicken, seafood or even vegetables showed up in my imaginary recipe.
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Mac 'n' cheese balls, with meatballs.[/caption]
Barb is the waitress who always takes care of us at DiCristina's. We like her because she's always laughing, and because she tells us about offbeat dishes we might not have found on our own. (DiCristina's has a big menu.) Today, she tells me about a new dish in which the famous mac 'n' cheese is rolled up into a ball and deep-fried. It is then covered with Alfredo sauce, a bit of red gravy, and two cheeses--mozzarella and cheddar. No meatballs, sausage, shrimp, or anything else along those lines.
Sound familiar? Even though the idea of a fried ball of macaroni would on any other day be laughable, this was indeed the very dish that floated around in what's left in my brain on my way here. How could I not get it?
I couldn't dope out what kept the three macaroni balls together. They weren't browned anywhere, but they nevertheless did hold together. A bed of mac 'n' Alfredo was the next stratum moving down, and the red sauce was last. I could only eat one of the mac-o-balls before I felt stuffed. I must say it was worth eating, perhaps because it was so close to what I had in mind.
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Fried ravioli.[/caption]
At dinner, I still wasn't hungry enough to return to the dish. But when I told MA about it--hoping for a gentle cheer to show her that I am open-minded enough to get such a thing. MA is a great admirer of mac 'n' cheese.
"Didn't you know that fried macaroni balls is a hot new dish around the whole country?" she asked. No. No, I didn't. So much for my registering a point on this scoreboard. I cannot impress my wife for anything.
Fortunately, I had other things on my mind. The temperature is forecast to drop as low as twenty degrees tonight at the Cool Water Ranch. All my pipes are wrapped, and we have gone below that temperature in the past with no problems. Still, I let the thin stream of water coming from a faucet at the far end of the house. The pipe from the water well is at the other end. That should take care of any problems. Never theless, four or five times during the night I walked around the house and let the water flow from every fauce for a half-minute or so. MA laughs at my paranoia. A small price to pay to avoid broken pipes. That's what we old guys do to impress our womenfolk that we are necessary.
DiCristina's. Covington: 810 N Columbia. 985-875-0160.
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Saturday, January 7, 2017. 20s
C-c-c-CO-C-COLD!
The temperature outside bottoms out at 25 degrees at the Ranch. The little stream still runs from the far faucet, which tells me that everything else is all right. A brilliant high-pressure sun is out. But it's hours before the thermometer rises past the 30 mark.
I run my Saturday errands without stopping for breakfast, a meal I would like to have had this morning. I get along on my standard slice of toast, glass of orange juice, and two cups of café au lait. That brings me to showtime on WWL, where I remain with a constant flow of callers throughout the ealy afternoon until three. I would like to have taken a hike through the woods, but it's still way too cold.
Mary Leigh attempts to come across for a visit. But the northbound drawbridge on the Causeway has some sort of emergency problem that has a crew there working and a large backup of traffic moving at the speed of ice until four. I'm glad I don't have to cross today.
MA and I have dinner at Impastato Cellars in Madisonville. We haven't been there in awhile, and the restaurant is hosting an Eat Club dinner on the twenty-fifth. I use the need to go there to update my facts as a reason for going there tonight. We sit on the peculiar veranda that hangs off the back wall, and are kept very warm by a battalion of gas-fired, well-ventilated indoor heaters.
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Baked Italian oysters. [/caption]
Most of the dinner is straightforward. We begin with baked Italian oysters and fettuccine Alfredo. MA has a salad with a lot of shrimp scattered atop it. I have a house salad before moving to a new dish on the menu. It's panned eggplant on the bottom layer, short tubes of pasta with a white sauce (although it's lighter than the one on the fettuccine, with crabmeat between the layers. The only flaw anywhere in the flow is that I eat the baked oysters too soon and burn my mouth.
I am always amazed by how well the tissues inside the mouth recover from cut and burns like this. I though this would be a bad one, but by morning it's as if nothing happened.
I get a wedge of Angelo Brocato's spumone for dessert, and to cool the mouth burn. But I'm a little late for that to make a difference.
Or was I?
MA and I have been watching more movies at home lately. As she shopped for a film for tonight, I see "The Magnificent Ambersons" flash by. This is the film that Orson Welles wrote and directed in the aftermath of "Citizen Kane." I've read the Booth Tarkington novel on which it's based, but never had I seen the movie. MA was bored by it early on. I also thought it was a bit long--and that was after an hour had been edited out by the producers. Welles always needed some extra time for his sometimes pompous tricks. I stuck with it to the end. I remember the book as being depressing, and the movie is, too--even though RKO toned it down a bit.
Impastato Cellars. Madisonville: 240 Highway 22 E. 985-845-4445.
