Monday, February 15, 2016.
Red Beans, No Hot Sausage. Stormy. Screechy.
Mary Ann is not easily satisfied by the tables she and I get when we dine out. At lunch today at New Orleans Food & Spirits, I arrive first. But the tables in the porch-like, enclosed first dining room are full. The server, who knows us as regulars, brings me to another table in the main dining room. It has windows on two sides. A great table by the standards of most people. But I don't really settle in, because. . . well, here MA is now, and she says she doesn't like the big dining room. It rumbles, she says. Must be the air conditioning equipment below. (Most of NOF&S hangs over the bed of the Bogue Falaya River.) So we move to the porch, where they almost have a table ready. A few minutes later, we finally sit down.
[caption id="attachment_16696" align="alignnone" width="400"]
New Orleans Food & Spirits, with pork chop.[/caption]
I remember being picky like that when I was in my twenties, I gave up that habit in later years, especially once MA was on the scene.
I do have my preferences, however. NOF&S makes excellent red beans. But they are one of the few red-bean vendors that doesn't offer hot sausage patties as an option with the beans. They have smoked sausage, grilled chicken, grilled catfish, and a pork chop. That certainly seems like enough effort on their part. But I love that beans-and hot-sausage thing so much that I bring the matter up with the server and the manager every time I'm there. They are not irritated by this. But nor do they promise that they will ever add hot sausage to their menu.
"You think you can get any restaurant to do anything you like by just badgering them," MA says. "But they don't need you. You'll never get it!" (She means that last sentence in both ways.)
"I'm not trying to make them do anything," I says. "I'll keep coming back. Their food is too good for me not to. But someday, they will try hot sausage, and the results will be so good that they will go along!"
MA rolls her eyes. Here come the red beans--perfect, as always. And a grilled pork chop, with its upcharge of a dollar. Not bad: ten dollars total for the beans and the chop and the salad.
During the radio show, an enormous thunderstorm--with the heavy emphasis on the thunder--rolls through the Cool Water Ranch. The strikes seem to be very close by. The dog Susie confirms this. Like most old dogs, she is afraid of thunder (and fireworks and rifle shots), and is nowhere to be found.
The storms end by the time chorus rehearsal commences. We work on a bunch of the doo-wop songs for our next concert. Conductor Alissa Rowe is not here tonight, and so I avoid a ticklish subject. I volunteered to do the solo for "Duke Of Earl." Oh, how I remember being able to belt that song out when I was in sixth grade. I believe that I still can. But Gene Chandler's skyscraping high notes are clearly beyond my range. I can't even hit them in falsetto. I start in on the note, and a second later I am screeching. I think they might need to get a soprano to do that part.
I wonder if a patty of hot sausage eaten right before would help.
New Orleans Food & Spirits, with pork chop.[/caption]
I remember being picky like that when I was in my twenties, I gave up that habit in later years, especially once MA was on the scene.
I do have my preferences, however. NOF&S makes excellent red beans. But they are one of the few red-bean vendors that doesn't offer hot sausage patties as an option with the beans. They have smoked sausage, grilled chicken, grilled catfish, and a pork chop. That certainly seems like enough effort on their part. But I love that beans-and hot-sausage thing so much that I bring the matter up with the server and the manager every time I'm there. They are not irritated by this. But nor do they promise that they will ever add hot sausage to their menu.
"You think you can get any restaurant to do anything you like by just badgering them," MA says. "But they don't need you. You'll never get it!" (She means that last sentence in both ways.)
"I'm not trying to make them do anything," I says. "I'll keep coming back. Their food is too good for me not to. But someday, they will try hot sausage, and the results will be so good that they will go along!"
MA rolls her eyes. Here come the red beans--perfect, as always. And a grilled pork chop, with its upcharge of a dollar. Not bad: ten dollars total for the beans and the chop and the salad.
During the radio show, an enormous thunderstorm--with the heavy emphasis on the thunder--rolls through the Cool Water Ranch. The strikes seem to be very close by. The dog Susie confirms this. Like most old dogs, she is afraid of thunder (and fireworks and rifle shots), and is nowhere to be found.
The storms end by the time chorus rehearsal commences. We work on a bunch of the doo-wop songs for our next concert. Conductor Alissa Rowe is not here tonight, and so I avoid a ticklish subject. I volunteered to do the solo for "Duke Of Earl." Oh, how I remember being able to belt that song out when I was in sixth grade. I believe that I still can. But Gene Chandler's skyscraping high notes are clearly beyond my range. I can't even hit them in falsetto. I start in on the note, and a second later I am screeching. I think they might need to get a soprano to do that part.
I wonder if a patty of hot sausage eaten right before would help.
