Monday, January 17, 2011. Camellia Café. Chicken Parm. Mary Ann suggested lunch. I suggested Camellia Café, for its appealing (to her) mini-buffet with fried chicken. That got her. I ordered one of the few things I haven't yet had from this widely varied menu: chicken parmigiana. I didn't have my hopes up, because they don't have much in the way of red sauce dishes elsewhere on the menu. The chicken was overfried to an unappealing darkness at the breading, and the sauce was jejune.
Okay. Henceforth, I am free to get what I really want from this place. That includes red beans and rice, roast beef or fried oyster poor boys, soups, seafood platters, salads, and bread pudding. I'd call this place the Mandina's of the North Shore if there weren't an actual Mandina's on the North Shore. It serves a well-turned-out collection of the local basics, and close to home by Abita Springs standards (five miles round trip). And the service, which was terrible in the first year or so, has become good.
Peggy Scott Laborde and Pelican Publishing are both leaning on me to get off my first volleys for The Lost Restaurants Of New Orleans, which is planned to come out this fall. I have about three-fourths of it written, but I'm letting the words age ferment and age. When I come back to them, I will see many ways to make the much better. That doesn't happen when I write an article and immediately copy-edit it.
I love this aspect of the brain, and I use it all the time. It's a great way to learn difficult skills, like music or building websites. You can't get something, and you leave it. When you come back to it, you have a breakthrough. It even works in solving crossword puzzles. It's almost like having two heads.
I wonder: if I had two heads, which of them would be the better looking? Would that one be the one everyone talks to? Would it be the one most people think is the smarter? Would they argue with one another, or even hate one another? Maybe one is best.
Camellia Cafe. Abita Springs: 69455 LA 59. 985-809-6313.
