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Saturday, October 4, 2014.
Breakfast For A Change. In The Cold At Jubilee.[/title]
Mary Ann says we don't think alike. Yet whenever I'm thinking that it would be nice to go out for breakfast of a Saturday morning, all I need to do is wait, and within a few minutes, she advances the same idea. Even though she always couches it in language that makes it sound like a sacrifice for her, I know she wants breakfast too. Her ordering the "Country Boy" (all the meat in the house except the steak) omelette at Mattina Bella is enough proof of that.
As many times as we've breakfasted at Mattina Bella, I don't think I've ever had a waffle. I fix that today. Is the whole-grain version any good? I ask the waitress. Or just a sop to the natural-foods people? Her face brightens in a way that could not be faked. "It's one of my favorite things," she says. I can see why. Imagine the goodness of a pecan waffle, with some of that woodsy flavor and texture from unidentifiable grains, small and large. It makes my A-list.
I go shopping for clothes. I find two nice-looking suits for about $250 total at Belk. I know it's a discount, clear-the-inventory kind of store, but I always find exactly the thing I have in mind. (No doubt this owes to my wearing the same styles since I was in high school.) Beyond that, even though it's in a big, featureless mall, Belk has the feeling of an old-style department store. For a member of the generation that vividly remembers shopping at D. H. Holmes and Maison Blanche on Canal Street (and not just when I was a little kid), stores like this will always have appeal.
And they still sell bow ties (the kind I tie myself, of course) and suspenders (the ones using buttons to affix themselves to the trousers, not clamps). My kind of haberdasher.
But the most interesting revelation in this duds-buying venture is that the waists of the suit pants are two inches smaller than I have fit into since 1990.
Speaking of my old-pooperoo proclivities: my longtime friend and fellow journalist Bonnie Warren wrote an article for New Orleans Magazine's online daily that investigated my longtime exclusive use of fountain pens. Could my type be coming into vogue again? I won't hold my breath.
It's day three of our new program of keeping the dogs confined. After I finish the radio show (just an hour again today), I take first the dog Suzie and then the twice-as-big dog Barry for a lap each around the grounds. They seem to take to it well enough.
To dinner at Jubilee, the current restaurant in the old (as in 100 years) bakery in Mandeville. Each succeeding tenant of this place improves upon it, but the people who have it now made the most substantial alterations yet. Most appealing to Mary Ann is the courtyard around back. It is as yet under-planted, A few trees will make it marvelous in a couple of years. But on a clear night like tonight, with the Hunter's Moon almost complete and the last of the prominent summer stars heading west--it's very nice.
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Fries at Jubilee.[/caption]And a little too cold for the girls. What evolutionary survival value is there in the apparently universal habit of beautiful women (the only kind living in my house) of walking around in short dresses and bare shoulders on cool evenings, while we sensible men are duded up in jacket and tie?
We begin with a cone of pommes frites. We have no disagreement that these are ten-out-of-ten fries, but MA thinks they're frozen, and I say fresh cut. We forget to inquire.
We move on to the second shrimp bisque I've had in as many days. Creamy, spicy, good. Mary Leigh has a spinach salad with blue cheese, strawberries, and pecans. This salad is now ubiquitous in local restaurants. It needs a name. The first chef to offer it in my recollection was Scott Varnedoe, in his days as chef of the Marigny Brasserie. But I'm not sure enough about that to use his name on it.
We haven't named new dishes for famous local people or places in quite awhile. I think I'll bring this up on the radio show, where with luck we'll come up with a memorable name for that very good salad.
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Veal with crabmeat and port wine sauce at Jubilee.[/caption]
I have the best dish in the house for the entree course. Veal with crabmeat, a port wine reduction, and a dill butter sauce. Good though this is, I still say that veal round--almost universal in dishes like this--needs to be either sliced or pounded thinner than has become the norm.
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Pork osso buco.[/caption]
Mary Ann gets pork osso buco. It's cooked perfectly for the gourmet, but MA is no fan of meats cooked less than well-done. This is not quite falling off the bone, but it's tasty anyway--particularly the meaty sauce.
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Empanadas at Jubilee.[/caption]
Mary Leigh is eating very light, and has a quartet of tapas-size beef empanadas. Mary Ann and I each eat one of those. Our daughter maintains a healthy diet. The Boy--who tonight is hanging out with his hockey friends at some kind of reunion at Loyola--also keeps trim. They are an inspiration to us both.
While we enjoy the evening, three weddings are in various stages around us. One is in progress at the church across the street. Another is a block away in a big old house that has lately become a reception call. The third is being handled somewhere else by Jubilee's chef Tory Stewart. Is he lucky or unlucky that the restaurant itself is having a slow night, due mostly to the omnipresence of football?
I would like dessert, but the Marys are suddenly being chewed up[on by mosquitoes. Too cold and mosquitoes? How does that happen? I resist the temptation to observe that we should have eaten indoors.
[title type="h5"]Jubilee. Mandeville: 301 Lafitte St. 985-778-2552.[/title]
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[title type="h5"]Sunday, October 5, 2014.
The Rarity Of Soup.[/title]
Mary Ann says that I must walk not just one but both of the leashed dogs at the same time. Everything goes smoothly until a contingent from next door of two small children, their parents, and two dogs (one of them very large) appears on the gravel servitude across the ranch. My two canines make three-foot dashes from imaginary starting blocks, quickly to be stopped by my hand on their leashes. The force of them comes close to yanking me off balance. A lot of barking, but conflict is averted. The system works. And I learn how powerful the dog Barry is. I must remember that next time the lawn tractor gets stuck in mud.
Lately, I have a hankering for soup. Not many restaurants serve decent soups, other than gumbos and cream soups loaded with rich, heavy flavors and textures. My desire makes me decide on Zea as a dinner spot with Mary Ann. The soup of the day there is a rough-hewn tomato potage. I didn't like it the first times I had it, because they sprinkle parmesan cheese in it. Ruined the whole fresh flavor. I am in the habit now of asking them to leave the cheese off. (I also mention this when ordering the Zea house salad, which is very good but also possessed of a handful of unnecessary shredded cheese. Unless you ask otherwise.
Written by Tom Fitzmorris October 13, 2014 12:01 in
