Wednesday, August 8, 2016.
Surprising Deliciousness At Creole Grille.
Some of the people who come often to our Eat Club dinners are predictable. I know which dinners they'll be among the first to reserve, and the ones where I will never see them. We even have a few who I see almost every week, no matter where the dinner is. (Those, curiously, are nearing the end of their association with us, because there's little we can do that they haven't done before.)
I knew that tonight's dinner, at the Creole Grille in Metairie, would bring in curiosity seekers, and few others. The Creole Grille is not on a lot of mental dining maps. It's on Veterans Boulevard well past Clearview. That large patch of Metairie has never had many interesting restaurants. What's more, not only is in in a strip mall, but flanked by a supermarket. Think about it: when have you ever seen a restaurant with serious food next to a grocery store? Unless the restaurant was there first, it almost never happens.
Each of the three or four times I ate in the Creole Grille for review purposes a couple of years ago, the food was a big surprise. The classic New Orleans neighborhood-café menu fit right into the looks of the place. But everything had a little something extra in the selection of the raw materials, the cooking, and the presentations.
They wanted to do an Eat Club dinner, but I wondered whether it would fly. Selling it was harder than usual, and even after a month of promotion we only had thirty-five people.
That was lucky, because the place could not have held many more. Those who took a chance on it ended with meal with their jaws gaping. Everything both on the plates and in the glassware was over the top.
The dinner started with a thick, rich (a little too on both counts, I'd say) soup made with all the ingredients you'd use to make meat-stuffed bell peppers. Sounds strange, but the flavors were fascinating. Three people asked me to get the recipe for them.
Then an original new oyster appetizer. Andouille-crusted oysters are like the old stuffed oysters we used to get at West End, with the oyster inside an oval of stuffing. It had a crackly texture from panko bread crumbs and a smoky-spicy flavor from the andouille. After being fried, they arrived in a shallow sea of orange hot sauce butter--like hot wings. So good were they that people were trying to figure out how to get more.
But this was a big meal, and we moved on. Chef-owner Jeff Smith (no connection with the disgraced Frugal Gourmet of the same name) moved the pork chop ahead of the fish course. He wanted to show off the chop, its bourbon barbecue sauce, and its wine before we were too full to appreciate them. The chop was a little overcooked for my tastes (I like to see pink), but in every other particular it was good stuff, tender and nicely seasoned. But what got our attention was the potato side. Thick slices of unpeeled fingerling potatoes, covered with blue cheese, a little bacon, and a few other things. I had to stop myself from eating all of that. The Barbera from Terra d'Oro was a tasty wine on its own, but packed too much punch for this pairing to be perfect.
Now pompano with crabmeat. This fulfilled the promise of those magic words, and came with the best wine of the night: Folie a Deux Russian River Chardonnay. I had a glass during the hour between the end of the radio show and the beginning of the dinner, and found a big, rich body that was great all by itself (something I'm looking for, now that I'm backing away from cocktails) as well as with that full-flavored fish.
The Creole Grille has always put out a bread pudding as beautiful as it was smooth and rich. This one was dressed with chocolate. Not my favorite idea (to me, bread pudding is about vanilla), but the chocolate was restrained and it was enjoyable.
I sat with a fascinating couple who'd been to a few previous dinners. He's a retired training pilot who worked for Boeing for many years--ten of which they spent in Beijing. We talked for a long time about the differences in Chinese food here and there. Then it came out that they were members of the Chaine des Rotisseurs, an ancient, international gourmet society. Since moving back to America, they had been unable to connect with a Chaine chapter here. The planets must have been in alignment, because two tables away were Carolise and Irv Rosen. Carolise has been the bailli of the New Orleans Chaine chapter for a long time. It's a private club, but one of the international rules is that a member there is also a member here. I think they made an arrangement.
During the radio show Chef Jeff visited a few times. We got to the bottom of a question I wondered about: whither Mr. Ed? Ed McIntyre--the owner of the several Mr. Ed's and Austin's--opened this place not long after the hurricane. Jeff bought it from him three years ago, and there is no longer any connection. It's really a different restaurant from Ed's places.
The departing comments were of a piece: "I had no idea this place was anywhere near this good!" It is. And everything we had tonight was right off the menu.
Creole Grille. Metairie: 5241 Veterans Memorial Blvd. 504-889-7992.
