Foodback: Zea's Asian Oysters
Peter sez. . . I have never shared your fascination with Zea. I go to the one in Covington occasionally (usually at the suggestion of someone else) but typically leave dissatisfied. The last time I went i ordered the fried oysters that come drizzled with an Asian teriyaki sauce. It was at a time when most restaurants that had oysters were shucking big fat ones and so I was surprised when my plate came with mostly midget mollusks. I performed a little surgery on some and it looked like the oysters had been cut into smaller pieces. Is that a familiar practice? One had no oyster in it all (not one that I could locate, at least!).
Tomment: That dish is one of the best that Zea does all year long, in my opinion. But when one person has a strong feeling about a dish, there's almost always another person who feels just as strong, but in the opposite direction. I have never seen oysters cut in half in any restaurant, and certainly not at Zea. When you pointed this out to the waiter, what did he do? You did send it back, didn't you? My main upset about this dish is that Zea takes it off the menu when the oysters start getting small. But anyone can goof. I have sent a few dishes back over there, and they always fix it immediately.
Phelps Insignia Explains $195 Dinner
Chef Tom Wolfe from the Royal Orleans Hotel appeared on the radio show yesterday with a good explanation for what at first registered to me as a too-high price for its wine dinner tomorrow (May 26) night. The price of the dinner is $150 plus plus. The tax and tip bring it up to a record high of $195, one of two NOWFE dinners this year at that price. (The other is R'Evolution.)
What Chef Tom brought with him was a bottle of Phelps winery's Insignia, the wine with the most connvincing claim as California's first "meritage" wine, in which a variety of grape varieties are blended to get the most out of all of them. Insignia is expensive and hard to get. But there it will be in the Rib Room tomorrow night. Chef Tom poured me (and himself) a glassful, just to check and make sure that the excellence we remember is still there. It is.
All thirty-one of the New Orleans Wine & Food Experience wine dinners are tomorrow night. Reservations are still to be had almost everywhere.
Foodback: Zea's Asian Oysters
Peter sez. . . I have never shared your fascination with Zea. I go to the one in Covington occasionally (usually at the suggestion of someone else) but typically leave dissatisfied. The last time I went i ordered the fried oysters that come drizzled with an Asian teriyaki sauce. It was at a time when most restaurants that had oysters were shucking big fat ones and so I was surprised when my plate came with mostly midget mollusks. I performed a little surgery on some and it looked like the oysters had been cut into smaller pieces. Is that a familiar practice? One had no oyster in it all (not one that I could locate, at least!).
Tomment: That dish is one of the best that Zea does all year long, in my opinion. But when one person has a strong feeling about a dish, there's almost always another person who feels just as strong, but in the opposite direction. I have never seen oysters cut in half in any restaurant, and certainly not at Zea. When you pointed this out to the waiter, what did he do? You did send it back, didn't you? My main upset about this dish is that Zea takes it off the menu when the oysters start getting small. But anyone can goof. I have sent a few dishes back over there, and they always fix it immediately.
Phelps Insignia Explains $195 Dinner
Chef Tom Wolfe from the Royal Orleans Hotel appeared on the radio show yesterday with a good explanation for what at first registered to me as a too-high price for its wine dinner tomorrow (May 26) night. The price of the dinner is $150 plus plus. The tax and tip bring it up to a record high of $195, one of two NOWFE dinners this year at that price. (The other is R'Evolution.)
What Chef Tom brought with him was a bottle of Phelps winery's Insignia, the wine with the most connvincing claim as California's first "meritage" wine, in which a variety of grape varieties are blended to get the most out of all of them. Insignia is expensive and hard to get. But there it will be in the Rib Room tomorrow night. Chef Tom poured me (and himself) a glassful, just to check and make sure that the excellence we remember is still there. It is.
All thirty-one of the New Orleans Wine & Food Experience wine dinners are tomorrow night. Reservations are still to be had almost everywhere.
