Emeril led--perhaps even started--the most powerful current local trend in cooking: finding the best local ingredients and making everything from scratch. His flagship restaurant innovates consistently without leaving the New Orleans flavor palette or ignoring the preferences of diners. A good example is its recent shift to a menu dominated by small plates. That not only made dining here more varied and interesting, but also made it more affordable, at a critical time. Also here: the best restaurant pastry shop in town, with fresh breads and an amazing dessert list.
Emeril Lagasse has one of the greatest disadvantages a restaurateur can have in New Orleans: he's very successful. Visitors to New Orleans, unaffected by this disease of local diners, get a disproportionate number of the tables. But the restaurant has been one of the best in town since it opened, and it still is.
Emeril Lagasse needs no introduction other than to say that the guy you see on television is not the real chef. He's a lot calmer and nicer in person. After entering the cooking trade in his native New England, he charmed the Brennans at Commander's Palace into letting him run the kitchen there in the early 1980s, when he was still in his twenties. He opened Emeril's in 1990. It was the first big-time chef-owned restaurant in New Orleans history, and it took off immediately, spawning two other local eateries and many more elsewhere (the empire now stands at eleven). After the hurricane, Emeril took a lot of flak for not being in town much--even as he raised several million dollars for the recovery in his travels. Although he does show up in the restaurant now and then, the day-to-day is handled by others.
It's a renovated warehouse, its industrial aspect softened with improved acoustics (although it remains a loud restaurant) and artfully designed but casual furnishings. Particularly interesting is the arch over the food bar, where those most interested in cooking can watch the action while eating atop barstools. A second large dining room runs alongside the wine cellar, with a bar at the intersection of the two rooms.
Nine times out of ten, the specials are the best food in this restaurant on any given night. No other restaurant puts more into devising these. It is a tremendous help that the post the specials on line every day. With the small plates menu, it's easy to construct a tasting menu of many courses--a good strategy. Dining at the food bar, with the chefs working within eyeshot, is fun. It helps to let all the staff know you're local.
| Attitude | 2 |
|---|---|
| Environment | 2 |
| Hipness | 3 |
| Local Color | 2 |
| Service | 3 |
| Value | 1 |
| Wine | 3 |
