Monday, September 13, 2015.
Closed On Monday.
I'm sure I'm not the first person to say that Monday the Thirteenth should be more unlucky than the Friday of that Monday's week. Friday is the day whose arrival we look forward to and celebrate more than any other. And Monday is a drag.
This is especially true as regards our mutual eating obsession. Stories of being turned away hungry from the door of a restaurant closed on Monday are legendary. My worst such experience involved a lady in whom I was interested, and who had accepted my invitation to lunch one Monday. I asked her to meet me at Sclafani's on Causeway Boulevard. (That fact dates this anecdote to the late 1970s or early 1980s, and me to my late twenties.) I was already writing restaurant reviews for over ten years, and achieved some authority on the subject. But not enough on this day. Sclafani's was closed on Mondays. Drat! Let's go to the Red Onion. We did. I blanched when I saw it closed, as were the next two. We wound up at Haagen Dasz. I couldn't bear to call her after that.
And here we went again. With both the Marys out of town,my lunch choices were wide open. First on the list is a little poor boy shop on LA 36 that Mary Ann laments every time we pass it. She will never go there, because of her squeamishness about places that look like that. That poses no problem for me, but it doesn't matter, because the place is not open.
Next on my list is the new location of the Fat Spoon, which I have enjoyed in its LA 59 spot in Mandeville for years, especially at breakfast. It has taken over the former Frostop in Covington, which I miss because for at least awhile they made a great roast beef poor boy. The new Fat Spoon may be open in the general sense, but it's not open on Monday.
Next stop: Pho Saigon, on Causeay Boulevard near the Wal-Mart. I have heard good things about this place, which has been there long enough for me to consider reviewing it. But it'sthe same story: closed Mondays.
[caption id="attachment_43616" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Mole with chicken at La Carreta.[/caption]
I'm not only exasperated but running out of time. I cross the parking lot to La Carreta's new (some six months) location. Unlike the restaurant's Mandeville branch, this Carreta has chicken with molé. I don't want that big a meal, so I ask the youngish waiter if he can make a pair of cheese enchiladas with the molé sauce on top--a classic use of the chocolate-and-chile sauce. He is puzzled, and so is the kitchen. It takes the waiter about ten tortilla-chip-and-salsa glomming minutes to find out whether this request were possible. Must have gone through the Hammond office. The answer is yes. It comes and is good. Minor error: the waiter brought refried beans instead of Carreta's great bean soup. But it's Monday. The Thirteenth.
The bad luck ends after lunch. I am heading home to get ready for the radio show when a call comes in from David Beaupre--the young man known to readers of this department--until I write these words--as "The Boy." Mary Leigh's boyfriend. He and I had planned to get together for a drink or a quick supper in Tucson, where he has been engaged by the Army after his ROTC service. My train from New Orleans to Los Angeles stops in Tucson for almost an hour. But the train was running late, giving no time for anyone to get off the train except for those poor folks who must have a cigarette.
Dave is calling with a question, one he had hoped to ask when we met in Tucson. "Mr. Fitzmorris," (he always called me that, although I told him to just call me Tom), "may I have permission to ask Mary Leigh to marry me?"
I'm all for it, I told him. Does he think she will say yes? He's pretty sure of it, he says. They are on their way to Las Vegas, where he will put forth his proposition. I tell him that I think he's a fine young man, and that I have always liked to be in the aura of love the two of them surround themselves with all the time.
Well! Part Two of this unfolding drama thus endeth.
At tonight's NPAS rehearsal of our upcoming concert of the music of Stephen Sondheim, the chairs are arranged such that I am sitting only about three feet from our energetic, entertaining director Alissa Mercurio Rowe. That means she will hear all my notes clearly, something in which I live in fear. I am far from perfectly in key when I sing. I also have a way of getting lost in the music if it's new to me. But she had nothing but good things to say about the tenor section in general, even saying that the part we're doing is very difficult.
On the other hand, the guy sitting next to me gave me a nudge and the news that I was a half-step flat on one note. Trying to get it right is the kind of brain food I get from this hobby.
La Carreta. Covington: 812 Hyw 190. 985-400-5202.
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Tuesday, September 15, 2015.
Back To The Meatery.
To dinner at Toups Meatery, the unique bistro near City Park. I have not been here since reviewing it two or three years ago. The menu carries more or less the same category of food, but most of the dishes are different from those I remember.
My cellphone alerts me. It's Mary Leigh. I get up from the table and out onto the side walk. She says she is in Las Vegas, and that last night she and Dave dined at Gordon Ramsey's Steak House in the Venetian Hotel. How was it? Very good, actually, she says.
So, like, what else is going on? I ask. I can hear a certain giddy excitement in the tone of her voice. Have you and Dave hit it big at the blackjack tables? Not really. He played a little, but she didn't. Anything else? I ask.
"Dave proposed to me last night," she says. Did she say yes? "Yes." Good! "My ring is so beautiful. I'll send you a picture of it by text!" Wonderful! I'm so happy for her. We talk a little more, then return to our entertainments.
Thus ends another long chapter in the history of "The Folks Who Live At The Cool Water Ranch."
[caption id="attachment_48884" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Boudin balls @ Toups Meatery.[/caption]
I know I want to begin supper at Toups Meatery with the boudin balls, hot and spicy and breadier than I expect, but satisfying. The waitress helps me consider several entrees. The pork chop? The flank steak with bordelaise sauce? Or the. . . "Couvillion?"
[caption id="attachment_48883" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Courtbouillon of shrimp and drum @ Toups Meatery.[/caption]
"Couvillion" is a widely-used but mistakenly spelled and pronounced version of "courtbouillon," one of the best but least appreciated of classic Creole dishes. Its name means "brief boiling" in French, which sums up the recipe. This one, which the waitress says is the signature dish of Toups Meatery, is also her favorite dish. Tonight's formula has three very large, whole shrimp atop cut-up fillets of drumfish, all resting on a layer of rice with a dark-roux sauce flooding everything. This is one of two ways to make courtbouillon, with a nearly gumbo-like sauce. (The other is much lighter, a cousin of bouillabaisse.)
But where did this "couvillion" word come from? It seems that almost everyone who lives in New Orleans knows somebody with that last name. Fewer of us know what courtbouillon is. So the error is perpetuated.
I thought the flavors of the courtbouillon were very good. This is a dish that ought to be much more widespread than it is. A bit more seafood in the big bowl would have helped, but I didn't leave hungry.
I arrived early for dinner, and hardly anyone was dining at Toups Meatery. But that changed as the night wore on. The servers ask all newcomers whether they have reservations. The answer is that a lot of people had made reservations. That must mean that the place is doing much more business then the last time I took a taste and a look.
[caption id="attachment_48882" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Toups Meatery.[/caption]
A mellow mood came over me as I drove home. My little girl (all of twenty-three) is getting married. And the other Mary returns from two weeks in Los Angeles tomorrow.
And yet, it's Monday the Thirteenth.
Toups' Meatery. Mid-City: 845 N Carrollton Ave. 504-252-4999.
Mole with chicken at La Carreta.[/caption]
I'm not only exasperated but running out of time. I cross the parking lot to La Carreta's new (some six months) location. Unlike the restaurant's Mandeville branch, this Carreta has chicken with molé. I don't want that big a meal, so I ask the youngish waiter if he can make a pair of cheese enchiladas with the molé sauce on top--a classic use of the chocolate-and-chile sauce. He is puzzled, and so is the kitchen. It takes the waiter about ten tortilla-chip-and-salsa glomming minutes to find out whether this request were possible. Must have gone through the Hammond office. The answer is yes. It comes and is good. Minor error: the waiter brought refried beans instead of Carreta's great bean soup. But it's Monday. The Thirteenth.
The bad luck ends after lunch. I am heading home to get ready for the radio show when a call comes in from David Beaupre--the young man known to readers of this department--until I write these words--as "The Boy." Mary Leigh's boyfriend. He and I had planned to get together for a drink or a quick supper in Tucson, where he has been engaged by the Army after his ROTC service. My train from New Orleans to Los Angeles stops in Tucson for almost an hour. But the train was running late, giving no time for anyone to get off the train except for those poor folks who must have a cigarette.
Dave is calling with a question, one he had hoped to ask when we met in Tucson. "Mr. Fitzmorris," (he always called me that, although I told him to just call me Tom), "may I have permission to ask Mary Leigh to marry me?"
I'm all for it, I told him. Does he think she will say yes? He's pretty sure of it, he says. They are on their way to Las Vegas, where he will put forth his proposition. I tell him that I think he's a fine young man, and that I have always liked to be in the aura of love the two of them surround themselves with all the time.
Well! Part Two of this unfolding drama thus endeth.
At tonight's NPAS rehearsal of our upcoming concert of the music of Stephen Sondheim, the chairs are arranged such that I am sitting only about three feet from our energetic, entertaining director Alissa Mercurio Rowe. That means she will hear all my notes clearly, something in which I live in fear. I am far from perfectly in key when I sing. I also have a way of getting lost in the music if it's new to me. But she had nothing but good things to say about the tenor section in general, even saying that the part we're doing is very difficult.
On the other hand, the guy sitting next to me gave me a nudge and the news that I was a half-step flat on one note. Trying to get it right is the kind of brain food I get from this hobby.
Boudin balls @ Toups Meatery.[/caption]
I know I want to begin supper at Toups Meatery with the boudin balls, hot and spicy and breadier than I expect, but satisfying. The waitress helps me consider several entrees. The pork chop? The flank steak with bordelaise sauce? Or the. . . "Couvillion?"
[caption id="attachment_48883" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Courtbouillon of shrimp and drum @ Toups Meatery.[/caption]
"Couvillion" is a widely-used but mistakenly spelled and pronounced version of "courtbouillon," one of the best but least appreciated of classic Creole dishes. Its name means "brief boiling" in French, which sums up the recipe. This one, which the waitress says is the signature dish of Toups Meatery, is also her favorite dish. Tonight's formula has three very large, whole shrimp atop cut-up fillets of drumfish, all resting on a layer of rice with a dark-roux sauce flooding everything. This is one of two ways to make courtbouillon, with a nearly gumbo-like sauce. (The other is much lighter, a cousin of bouillabaisse.)
But where did this "couvillion" word come from? It seems that almost everyone who lives in New Orleans knows somebody with that last name. Fewer of us know what courtbouillon is. So the error is perpetuated.
I thought the flavors of the courtbouillon were very good. This is a dish that ought to be much more widespread than it is. A bit more seafood in the big bowl would have helped, but I didn't leave hungry.
I arrived early for dinner, and hardly anyone was dining at Toups Meatery. But that changed as the night wore on. The servers ask all newcomers whether they have reservations. The answer is that a lot of people had made reservations. That must mean that the place is doing much more business then the last time I took a taste and a look.
[caption id="attachment_48882" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Toups Meatery.[/caption]
A mellow mood came over me as I drove home. My little girl (all of twenty-three) is getting married. And the other Mary returns from two weeks in Los Angeles tomorrow.
And yet, it's Monday the Thirteenth.
