Saturday, August 10, 2013.
The Society For The Preservation Of Fine Dining.
Somebody sent me a list he found online today purporting to rank the coolest restaurants in town. The writer was not talking about places with the best air conditioning. (Which, unlike this one, would have been a useful list.) A quick scan of the list revealed the usual hangouts, whose coolness is such that they make it to almost every list on every criterion.
On the day I'm writing this, the semi-daily newspaper had two stories about the restaurant scene. One was the news that a national television show has selected two New Orleans chefs for its next absurd, faked-up battle. This knowledge could not possibly affect the goodness of anyone's next meal, and I recognized the chefs from their photos, so I moved on. The other main story was about all the new hamburger stands around town. Haven't I read this or something like it recently, maybe more than once?
On the current diary day, I had breakfast at the Abita Café, for the first time in two years at least. The former owner moved, and the new owner took awhile to perform a much-needed renovation. The Abita Café has a special place in my life, because for a few years it was where my subteen daughter and I had breakfast every Saturday.
The Abita Café never was a great place, but good enough. Judging by today's breakfast of eggs, bacon, grits, and toast, I'd say the new management is heading along the same course, and the food remains a bit too oily
While eating, I thought about the meals of the last few days. There was the dinner at Le Foret, which was in the all-time top five percentile of twenty years of Eat Club dinners. It was grandly served in a beautiful room, with polish showing in every course. That no food was made to jump through a hoop didn't keep it from being interesting or even exciting. Everybody said so, even the twenty- and thirty-somethings.
Then there was the hamburger Mary Ann persuaded me to eat at Barcadia the day after. Nothing wrong with it or the sides. Not for a hamburger place, with the food served in those flexible, colorful plastic baskets lined with wax paper, and a pile of paper napkins off to one side.
Barcadia and Le Foret are six blocks apart. Barcadia's been open a little less than a year; Le Foret is at four years. Barcadia's too young to rate, but if you made me I'd say two to three stars. Le Foret is a solid five-star.
But I'll bet more people know about Barcadia than they do about Le Foret. If they don't, then let's say that most of the hamburger places reported on today in the newspaper have higher profiles than Le Foret.
There is something wrong with this. I understand that nobody can eat in a five-star restaurant at every meal, and that burgers will always be more popular than tournedos Rossini.
But when one gets down and starts talking about great food, there's not much to say about even the best hamburger. On the other hand, you could go on for an hour about the likes of Le Foret. And you will remember a meal like that for years.
Burger? Or foie gras with yard egg and demi-glace?
Where all this took me was this idea: I am going to start an organization for the preservation of fine dining in America. In America, I say, because the scenario above is even more prevalent in the rest of the country, where the enormous power of the chains makes it so.
I think it's time to say the obvious so people can think about it: an ambitious, complex, skillful restaurant is better than an everyday kind of eatery. Even if you work this out as a ratio of enjoyment to price, it remains true.
It will be a battle. We are living in a time when obviousness is often gainsaid by the ability of some people to persuade a lot of other people that what is clearly false is actually true. (I am not talking politics here.)
There is one other problem. Everything I just said is boring to most people. I have a way of being didactic. (My use of the word "didactic" is a perfect example.) We need some other voices. I'd ask the major chefs, but they're too busy opening up hamburger, steak, and hot dog joints.
Yeah, as soon as I renovate this website (a huge project going on now and for the next few weeks) I will get this sucker started.
Abita Springs Cafe. Abita Springs: 22132 Level. 985-867-9950.
To browse through all of the Dining Diaries since 2008, go here.
