Wednesday, May 11, 2016.
Early Supper At Criollo.
Baseball steals the last half of my radio show today. I hate when that happens, but there's nothing that can be done about it.
If I had known (and it wouldn't be radio without unexpected changes) I would have stayed home today. Lord knows I have a lot to do. I'm still moving files from the dead computer into the new one. There is no easy way to do this, or at least not one I have found.
I kill an hour in my office at the station doing odds and ends tasks. I also slip in a fifteen-minute nap. Upon awakening, I check on the whereabouts of the Marys, to see if they are free for dinner. They aren't. Mary Leigh is testing recipes for her wedding cake, and can't leave the oven.
[caption id="attachment_51460" align="alignright" width="320"]
Dining room at Criollo, with the open kitchen distantly visible.[/caption]I walk the ten blocks to the Monteleone Hotel. The lobby is jammed with people checking in. The Carousel Bar is packed--not just on the carousel itself, but also in the comfortable new area behind it. When I make my way through all these people to the entrance of Criollo--the flagship restaurant of the Monteleone--I see a number of people spilling from the bar into the dining room.
Despite that, I get a table in the corner next to one of the many new windows the hotel added to this formerly dark part of the ground floor. The dining room is empty, but it's not even six yet. It will fill about halfway by the time I leave.
I am recognized by a waiter named Joseph. I remember meeting him in some other restaurant, but I can't remember which one. He tells me that he likes being here, and gives me a bunch of suggestions from the menu. They all sound pretty good.
Then a sous chef emerges from the kitchen to say hello. He too knows me from his work in other restaurants. This is how I am most often identified in restaurants, even when I am trying to mekeep a low profile. The hostesses never know, but waiters and cooks move around a lot, and they remember their customers better than the customers would believe.
The chef tells me a lot of flattering things, of which my favorite is that every review of mine he reads strikes him as being dead-on accurate. That's something I wouldn't even claim for myself, so it's nice to hear. He goes on to agree with my feeling that Criollo is one of the most underrated restaurants in town. "People think that since we are a hotel restaurant, we just get everything from the Sysco truck," he says. "But we put a lot of work into getting great seafood and produce and everything else."
My dinners at Criollo--this one included--bear this out. Any restaurant with the guts to put those superb Colorado lamb chops on the menu for a price in the $40s is indeed making a statement with his raw materials.
[caption id="attachment_51461" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Stuffed shrimp at Crioillo.[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_51462" align="alignleft" width="320"]
Soup tasting, from front: crawfish bisque, seafood gumbo, turtle soup.[/caption]Joseph talks me into the stuffed shrimp Bienville, served with a vegetable risotto. This is not at all what I had in mind to eat. It involves three very large shrimp with a ball of stuffing made almost entirely of crabmeat nestled into the curl of the decapods. The Bienville touch is an imitation of the sauce from the famous oyster dish. It all adds up to a double appetizer. But it works as an entree, and I am happy, even though I keep thinking about that lamb chop. Next time, I will get it. Also next time I will not eat a quarter of a roast beef poor boy in the early afternoon of the day I go to Criollo. (Regular readers will recall the sandwich I ate half of yesterday at Lee's Hamburgers in old Metairie. It still lives on, as of this writing.)
Back to Criollo. Before the stuffed shrimp arrive, I sample all three of the house soups. The turtle soup needs a little Tabasco, but is otherwise good. The crawfish bisque is a handshake between the dark-roux Cajun bisque and the creamy French approach. No stuffed heads (I don't miss them), but lots of crawfish tails. This is the best of the trio of soups. The seafood gumbo tastes right, but I can't make up my mind as to whether deep-fried, battered okra is a good idea.
Dessert is a beautiful original billed as a gelato napoleon. So, two layers of ice cream with various berries and whipped cream in between. The layers make it a napoleon, in a long reach.
[caption id="attachment_51463" align="alignnone" width="385"]
Gelato Napoleon.[/caption]
Thinking about that recalls a television commercial, for what product I can't remember. An actor dressed in a Napoleonic uniform has his hand inside his shirt (as Napoleon is always depicted). In his other hand is a classic French napoleon pastry. He is about to take a bite of it when the disembodied announcer asks him a question. I wonder whether anyone other than a gourmet got the joke.
Criollo. French Quarter: 214 Royal.
504-523-3341.
Dining room at Criollo, with the open kitchen distantly visible.[/caption]I walk the ten blocks to the Monteleone Hotel. The lobby is jammed with people checking in. The Carousel Bar is packed--not just on the carousel itself, but also in the comfortable new area behind it. When I make my way through all these people to the entrance of Criollo--the flagship restaurant of the Monteleone--I see a number of people spilling from the bar into the dining room.
Despite that, I get a table in the corner next to one of the many new windows the hotel added to this formerly dark part of the ground floor. The dining room is empty, but it's not even six yet. It will fill about halfway by the time I leave.
I am recognized by a waiter named Joseph. I remember meeting him in some other restaurant, but I can't remember which one. He tells me that he likes being here, and gives me a bunch of suggestions from the menu. They all sound pretty good.
Then a sous chef emerges from the kitchen to say hello. He too knows me from his work in other restaurants. This is how I am most often identified in restaurants, even when I am trying to mekeep a low profile. The hostesses never know, but waiters and cooks move around a lot, and they remember their customers better than the customers would believe.
The chef tells me a lot of flattering things, of which my favorite is that every review of mine he reads strikes him as being dead-on accurate. That's something I wouldn't even claim for myself, so it's nice to hear. He goes on to agree with my feeling that Criollo is one of the most underrated restaurants in town. "People think that since we are a hotel restaurant, we just get everything from the Sysco truck," he says. "But we put a lot of work into getting great seafood and produce and everything else."
My dinners at Criollo--this one included--bear this out. Any restaurant with the guts to put those superb Colorado lamb chops on the menu for a price in the $40s is indeed making a statement with his raw materials.
[caption id="attachment_51461" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Stuffed shrimp at Crioillo.[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_51462" align="alignleft" width="320"]
Soup tasting, from front: crawfish bisque, seafood gumbo, turtle soup.[/caption]Joseph talks me into the stuffed shrimp Bienville, served with a vegetable risotto. This is not at all what I had in mind to eat. It involves three very large shrimp with a ball of stuffing made almost entirely of crabmeat nestled into the curl of the decapods. The Bienville touch is an imitation of the sauce from the famous oyster dish. It all adds up to a double appetizer. But it works as an entree, and I am happy, even though I keep thinking about that lamb chop. Next time, I will get it. Also next time I will not eat a quarter of a roast beef poor boy in the early afternoon of the day I go to Criollo. (Regular readers will recall the sandwich I ate half of yesterday at Lee's Hamburgers in old Metairie. It still lives on, as of this writing.)
Back to Criollo. Before the stuffed shrimp arrive, I sample all three of the house soups. The turtle soup needs a little Tabasco, but is otherwise good. The crawfish bisque is a handshake between the dark-roux Cajun bisque and the creamy French approach. No stuffed heads (I don't miss them), but lots of crawfish tails. This is the best of the trio of soups. The seafood gumbo tastes right, but I can't make up my mind as to whether deep-fried, battered okra is a good idea.
Dessert is a beautiful original billed as a gelato napoleon. So, two layers of ice cream with various berries and whipped cream in between. The layers make it a napoleon, in a long reach.
[caption id="attachment_51463" align="alignnone" width="385"]
Gelato Napoleon.[/caption]
Thinking about that recalls a television commercial, for what product I can't remember. An actor dressed in a Napoleonic uniform has his hand inside his shirt (as Napoleon is always depicted). In his other hand is a classic French napoleon pastry. He is about to take a bite of it when the disembodied announcer asks him a question. I wonder whether anyone other than a gourmet got the joke.
