After the show last Thursday I went rogue, deviating from the plan to eat at a new place deep in the French Quarter called La Mensa. Some new places are worthy of notice, as this one is, but there are also a plethora of great restaurants in this city that no one talks about just because they have been around a while.
For many months I have wanted to go back to try NOLA again. We often park in front of it to go other places, and we surprisingly talk a lot about it on the show, but mainly about the first restaurant in that location - Spunto.
Tonight was the night. An impromptu deviation from the La Mensa plan left us as walk-ins, so it was a good thing we were early. Other people are not ignoring NOLA as we have been. It all came right back to me as we stepped in the door. Nothing has changed decor-wise since it arrived in the Nineties. And it looks Nineties.
But we were there to eat, and as soon as we were seated upstairs by the very affable staff, the menu called to me in ways that I knew would be embarrassing. I wanted nearly everything on it but alligator. It was a cold day so the wood fire beckoned. There would definitely be a pizza on this table.
There are a lot of pizzas out there now. On sight, this one was not a dazzler. It actually looked like the crust was pre-made. I am sure that is not the case, but it had no crust extending beyond the ingredients that bubbled on the edges with an appealing char. It was Quattro Formaggio, with the $6 extra housemade pepperoni all to one side. (Tom is a cheese guy.)
And now I am going to rhapsodize about the flavor of this pizza. It was a divinely greasy mess - the kind you have to maintain so that you are not sitting there with trails of grease down your arms to your elbows. There was cheddar on the pizza, which made it piquant in a way that I don’t often experience with a lowly pizza. I loved this pizza.
Before the pizza arrived, I got carried away with our delightful waitress Jessica’s description of the gumbo. It was cold and it was gumbo, so yes, please. This was a good gumbo, but there was a flavor profile that stood out from the rest. It was unpredictable. That sounds like I didn't like it, but I did, though it was not hard to shove this on Tom so I could focus on the pizza, which he was lukewarm about. There was a reddish cast to this gumbo, and it reminded me of red beans in color, but it definitely tasted like gumbo.
Tom ordered pasta to go with my pizza course. It was a mushroom linguine called Maggie’s Mushroom Farm Linguine. It also had corn in it, and a pesto sauce. I had to make myself break away from the pizza to try this pasta, and I was glad it belonged to Tom. There wasn’t anything really wrong with it, but the flavor was strongly earthy. Superior mushrooms, perhaps? Maybe Maggie’s Farm turns out intensely-flavored mushrooms?
Tom also got an oyster dish that was a special which came in a dish with indentations like an escargot dish. There was so much of the parmesan topping the oysters were invisible. He was as wild about this dish as I was about the pizza. A taste of the topping reminded me of the earthiness of the pasta.
Jessica and I had extensive conversations about the menu. She was no help because she loved everything on the menu. Who could blame her? I narrowed it down to the crusty wild salmon which is wild-caught in a preparation that sounded fantastic. Jessica was pulling for the lacquered duck with cornbread pudding and collard greens. I agreed. The salmon will have to wait, along with a half-dozen other things for subsequent visits.
The duck was beautiful when it came to the table in its cast-iron skillet. Two leg quarters sat atop the cornbread pudding and collards, one under each quarter. It was not cooked enough for me, not because it wasn’t perfectly cooked, which it was. But I had an epiphany here. Duck has to be almost confit for me to love it. This was very good, with a consistency more like the firmness of chicken than the shreddedness of a pulled pork. This is my problem, not theirs. For normal duck eaters, this would be a home run.
Everything else that went to every table looked great. At one point Tom mentioned that the food was a little outdated, and I can see what he meant. It was a little salty to my taste, and heavy, but perfectly classic New Orleans cliche food. And a most delicious and very well-crafted version of it. But the trends have made us eat lighter. It’s hard to ignore food that packs this much flavor. And I don’t agree, as I pointed out when Jessica sent stuffed chicken wings to an adjacent table. They were stuffed with Asian noodles and served with peanut sauce. What could be more present-day than this?
Tom got bread pudding that was beautifully presented. He was absolutely wowed by this dessert. I have never seen Tom go after traces of a sauce as he did here, stopping just short of licking the plate.
Where has this place been all our lives? Right in the Quarter waiting to be rediscovered after 20 years. We will be back, and soon.
Emeril’s NOLA
534 St. Louis St. New Orleans
504-522-6652
Sun-Th 11:30-10
Friday & Saturday till 11
emerilsrestaurants.com
