No Menu Tomorrow.
I am away on my annual retreat at Manresa in Convent, Louisiana. Where, amazingly, the food is good enough for me to report on. Saturday at lunch is the best red beans I have all year. Great pork loin Saturday night. Fried catfish and Seafood Gumbo on (of course) Friday. I will walk several miles on the levee, the Mississippi River at my feet. I can go down and touch it. All this is done in silence, which I have no trouble maintaining.
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Wednesday, November 16, 2016.
Fall Menu @ Peppermill.
The event last night at the Pontchartrain had me up late last night. I can't catch up today. In the background is the specter of the Marys, driving two carloads of furnishings from Mary Leigh's former apartment in Washington. D.C. They are making this run in two days, with today's run the longer. They will arrive deep into the night. To make sure they actually have an apartment waiting for them, I contact the landlord, who needs a few more forms electronically signed. One of them is for ML's big dog, it costs $500 for him to take up residence. A couple more checks in that vicinity have to be written and delivered to the apartment's office. I barely get all that done before radio air time.
I was to have dinner with the Marys after the show, but they are running far too late for that. I haven't had anything to eat all day, and the tension makes my creativity run low. I stop at the Peppermill, where I dine well but a bit too often.
They're offering a special autumn menu, which includes the kind of dishes you'd eat when it starts getting cold. The shepherd's pie is intriguing, but I cook that better than anyone else I know. (Because I can make it my way if I do it myself.) They also had brisket, served with brown gravy and mashed potatoes. I remember a time when I thought that combination was one of the better of suppers. I also had in mind that this might be a boiled beef brisket, such as what Tujague's, the Bon Ton, and the late Maylie's made house specialties. This wasn't that.
I should have gone with my first menu plan. First, an appetizer of oysters Riccobono (like Italian oysters, but with mushrooms in addition to the topping of seasoned bread crumbs, garlic, and a little Parmesan). Then a side salad, and a cup of soup if it sounded good (it did: cream of spinach). Caramel custard--one of the best versions in town, at least as good as Galatoire's famous versions--for dessert.
By the time the Marys check into apartment and load all the stuff into it, it's approaching midnight. Mary Ann's motherly instincts click in, darkly. and I tell her to ignore her perspectives of the moment. Tomorrow, things will look a lot better.
I awaken in the middle of the night listening to an episode of Escape, an old CBS Radio drama from the 1950s. It's written by no less than sci-fi master Ray Bradbury. In it, Americans land on Mars. They encounter Martians, who look just like us, and who don't believe it when the Americans state their origins. It turns out that the Earth-dwellers had landed in an insane asylum. The psychiatrists explain that all the Americans' fantastic stories are just illusions. Then the doctors shoot them all to death.
I will not listen to the radio-drama station late at night. It does nothing for one's sleep.
Peppermill. Metairie: 3524 Severn Ave. 504-455-2266.
