Thursday, March 7, 2013.
Up And Down The River, Part 6. All Day In Red Stick.
The riverboat Queen of the Mississippi pulled up to a landing especially made for riverboats on the east bank of the river in Baton Rouge. We were right across from the old state capitol, and next dock up from the USS Kidd, a World War II-era destroyer. It's permanently moored there as a museum. Jude and I spent the night on board the ship during our Cub Scout years. In an early show of his insistence on getting only the best, Jude was furious with the Kidd for being a much smaller ship than what he was accustomed to. That would be the USS Alabama in Mobile, where we shared our first experience with sleeping aboard a ship.
Mary Ann is leaving the Queen of the Mississippi today. Back when this plan was hatched, she couldn't imagine that she could stand a full week aboard a riverboat. She even had a plan for jumping ship after a day or two. But she was surprised by how much she liked the Queen of the Mississippi, and was disappointed that she had committed to hosting the radio show in my absence today and tomorrow. (Chef Duke Locicero filled in on the first three days of the week.)
We went onshore around eleven, to meet Mary Leigh--who had driven up this morning--at a restaurant called Stroube's. It's a few blocks from the riverboat, and has as its chef Scott Varnedoe. He was the chef on two different stints at the Marigny Brasserie, as well as at the Fairhope Inn years ago. For a time he had his own place in the Myrtles Plantation. A good chef, and a visitor on the radio show once or twice.
Stroube's is in the center of Baton Rouge, and gets a lot of lunch business from the many nearby offices. It's in a well-restored old building, with a rough but cool design that suggests an industrial past. It seemed to bill itself as a steak house. In fact, it's a straight-ahead Louisiana-style bistro.
We began with two dishes involving duck and andouille: a gumbo and a fried spring roll. Both very good. Then an excellent salad with various pickled vegetables (peppers, okra, beans) and pecans atop greens with feta cheese. And another notch in the knife handle for for our daughter, the Queen of Blue Cheese-Iceberg Wedge Salads.
She came back from that with--what else?--a cheeseburger with pickled jalapenos and fresh-cut fries. Mary Ann was very happy with the daily special, a plate of super-tender pot-roasted pork shoulder, with lots of greens. There was zero chance that she would order anything else with such a platter available.
The waiter touted the barbecue shrimp and grits to me. They were just pretty good. The same was true of a slice of homemade coconut cake with which we ended the eating.
We spoke with Scott Varnedoe for a minute, but both he and we had to get a move on. MA and I returned to the boat to load her luggage to ML's car. They sped off with what seemed to me too little time to get to the radio station to go on the air. But with MA driving in her usual bat-out-of-hell style, they made it with an hour to spare. I would have been late.
The riverboat remained at the riverbank all day, and so did I. I thought about getting an urgently-needed haircut, but I couldn't find a nearby barbershop. A lot of writing was waiting to be done, anyway. And there was the socializing at afternoon tea and the five-thirty cocktail party. And the ever-appealing afternoon nap. Riverboats are famously relaxing, but I can't say that until today I did much of that. It's probably because Mary Ann was always looking to do something else.
Another great dinner. Mine started with crab cakes, followed with five large sea scallops--too much to finish comfortably, so I finished them uncomfortably. They came with the smallest quantity of red beans and rice I've been served since I was a baby. (I don't remember that, but I have no doubt that my mother--for whom Monday red beans was an article of faith--fed me my first spoonful when I was very small.)
Several other people at the table were curious about osso buco, one of the other entree options. I talked them into it, and they thanked me later.
Compared with my rides on the American Queen--a much larger boat--the Queen of the Mississippi has served incomparably better food. But its entertainment was less impressive. The best show of the entire trip came tonight, when a quintet called the New Orleans Jazz All-Stars put on an hour of great music. I don't know any of the performers, although the leader said that he and I had met somewhere before. I think Tim McLaughlin used to play with these guys. Anyway, they were virtuosos all, with a wide range of repertoire. The most impressive moment came during a bass-and-drums only version of Big Noise From Winnetka, in which the drummer used his sticks to play on the strings of the bass--while the bassist was playing his own way. I've never seen the like of that.
To browse through all of the Dining Diaries since 2008, go here.
