Thursday, February 7, 2013.
Caught On The North Shore. Lamb Returns.
A man driving a large truck south across the Causeway yesterday evening had something disastrous happen to his vehicle. He lost control and tumbled into the lake. That shut down both sides of the Causeway as a search began for the truck and its driver. They opened the northbound span soon enough for me to head home. Through the day today, the bridges were still closing intermittently.
A laughably insignificant difficulty caused by the tragic accident (the driver died) was to prevent me from getting to the South Shore to perform the radio show. No big deal: I did it from my office at home. But this is now the ninth day that I've dined on the North Shore only. I bring this up only because readers often tell me that they think I over-report the North Shore dining scene. I certainly do, although not on purpose. Today I have a good excuse.
Not that excuses are worth any more than a tiny percentage of performance.
Adding to the repetitiveness was that MA and I went to Zea for dinner. I have en excuse here, too. The restaurant just made a few changes in their menu, and since I ad-lib a commercial for them every day, it would be necessary for me to check it out to make sure I'm telling the truth.
Specifically, the rotisserie lamb has returned to Zea on Thursday nights, for the first time in a few years. It's an interesting cut of lamb, one I'll have to ask the Taste Buds about. It's lamb sirloin, they say. It was tenderer than lamb leg. It was a shade undercooked for me. (I eat rare and even raw beef, but lamb seems to me to require something verging on medium for the flavors to emerge.) The sauce was a full-flavored brown affair with a hint of mint. Good stuff for $18, with dirty rice and Thai green beans on the side.
We began with guacamole, another returnee to the menu after many months' absence. The avocado salad is more than pretty good here, even though it comes with a clumsily-made salsa.
One big disappointment: it appears that our secret is out about the tables in the bar. They are without question the prime spots for dining at Zea. The main dining room--dominated as it is by rows of booths, giving a cubicle-like feeling to me--are much less comfortable. But tonight all the bar tables were taken, with no prospects for an opening soon.
At least my readers and listeners can't say I keep the best bits to myself. I've written often about that bar area.
Back at home, I was enough ahead of my daily workpile that I scanned an 1983-vintage print edition of the New Orleans Menu into the computer. I lost all my old N.O. Menus in the flooding of my downtown office after Katrina. I was amazed when a lady wrote to say that she had a few of the old editions, and would be happy to let me have them. In fact, she had almost all of them. But they are just sitting on a shelf, waiting for me to make copies that can survive another disaster.
But as I get older, such archives seem less and less important to me. I wonder whether that's a good or a bad thing.
To browse through all of the Dining Diaries since 2008, go here.
