Click the arrow on the left of the graphic below to hear me read it to you!
The sun with its solstice tells us that it’s time
To wring out the stockings in our wet clime
And give out again the songs of the season!
Forget for a moment about Drew Brees and
Celebrate how tasty a town we inhabit
With food so savory! So easy to grab it!
It’s nice that fourteen wasn’t one of those years
Whose ending we greet with relief and our cheers.
No tropical storms shook live oak and home
In trade, we paid dearly. Bad luck in the Dome.
Another swap made us all mad with the dreads
That oysters are scarce, in their bars and their beds
But taste fine as ever, and even more thrilling
More raw bars are open, shucking and grilling.
The number of restaurants on my dining index
Passed fourteen hundred. That data reflects
Many Mexican vendors, food we must try
Asian noodles are cool. If so tell me why
Lucky Rooster is now Juan’s Flying Burrito?
And round the corner, Johnny Besh said “Me, too.”
Said Besh is the busiest vendor of food.
His next restaurant has a Tel Aviv mood.
Friend Danny Millan fills up his new Cava
With adept young servers. Bravo and Brava!
But of all the new inns that try to astound
Square Root does it best, serving us in the round!
Unseen new foodstuffs, ingenious mouthfeels!
And touches of Mexico, too, in its meals.
But notice a pink elephant in in the room
To many millions did Brennan’s reopening zoom.
The eggshells did crack. Will the nut follow suit?
We think so, but that’s all-time record high loot.
One matter more for the new Chef Slade Rushing:
We want the old turtle soup. We’re not hushing.
Until it returns. And so should trout Kottwitz.
Steak Stanley too. And yes–Slade’s black truffle grits.
A few well-known chefs have been moving around.
Muriel’s Erik Veney came two blocks to be found.
Dominique left his namesake, for unknown stand.
Kevin Vizard to Southern Yacht Club. Oh, and
Chef Christian’s at Andrea’s–for both a good move!
Nick Gile at the new Richard Fiske’s in the groove.
Former Bombay Club site is new one. And oh:
Mike Gullotta from August opened MoPho.
New restaurants open. Big deal! When we’re blessed
With many old favorites that really are best
To slake our desire for our cuisine Creole
Or alla Italia, Français, or a big bowl
Of dark, spicy gumbo. That’s what it’s about.
To those who make that, we have this Christmas shout.
Hello Mr. B’s! How’s the ya-ya and shrimp
And crabcakes in which crabmeat you never skimp.
What’s with a steak house next to old Galatoire’s?
The old place stays still the same, like it always was.
Let’s pay a visit now at old chez Antoine
Where Rick Blount runs things with mother Yvonne
With a hot spot called Hermes: finally a bar!
Brings both the locals and drinkers from afar
With Sazeracs, old fashioneds, martinis and beers.
And oysters Foch poor boys. Hurray and three cheers!
The restaurateurs in this Yuletide roll call
Are so great in number I can’t name them all.
But surely I’m thinking of old Dick and Ella,
The Brennans retired, though you can’t tell a
Lally or Ti, Cindy, Ralph or a Dickie
That without the old folks they’d be quite so tricky.
Joy! Joe Impastato, and Sal, his dear brother
And the pasta and sauce they make for each other.
To Uptown let’s go to continue this tally
With Mark, Bob and Sandy at Pascal’s Manale.
Wassail John Harris; Shultes at Bistro Daisy
And Upperline’s JoAnn, still brilliantly crazy.
To Brigtsen’s loving couple, Marna and Frank.
The Taste Buds I hail as they drive to the bank.
A carol I sing to the one-name chefs too:
Susan, Emeril, and E-Man. Leah, Nanou.
This year was not free from sadness and woes.
After eighty-six years, friend Chris “Bozo” goes.
Richard Fiske to a new place leaves just his name.
Hassan Khaleghi’s gone, but Torches still flame.
In sadness. Next year, who will it be
That I’ll mention here? I hope it’s not thee.
My spirits are filled, though, with pure optimism.
Even in this time of political schism
Eschewing argument between left and right,
Happy folk tell me about food every night
To them and to you who visit me here,
Merry Christmas! Ho ho! To you all good cheer!
Tastefully yours,
Tom Fitzmorris
Court Of Two Sisters
The nice weather through most of December has made the Court’s marvelous outdoor dining areas unusually inviting for the indulgence of its Reveillon menu. The restaurant’s antique style makes it feel like Christmas all the time. It’s Reveillon menu starts with a turtle soup that matches any other, then moves on to some other good dishes selected for the season’s tastes. Best possible starter: the best Sazerac in town.
Four Courses, $45.
Turtle Soup au Sherry
~~~~~
Crab Cakes
Creole mustard vinaigrette
~~~~~
Duck Leg Confit
Candied sweet potatoes & pecan rice pilaf
~or~
Gulf Fish
Petite peas, brabant potatoes, chopped bacon, sliced mushrooms & sautéed shrimp, citrus beurre blanc
~or~
Frenched Breast of Chicken
Roasted with brabant potatoes, winter vegetables, chicken au jus
~~~~~
Rum Cake
French Quarter: 613 Royal. 504-522-7273.
FULL REVIEW
All the Reveillon menus can be perused here. We’ll feature one every day throughout the Reveillon season, which runs in most of the Reveillon restaurants until December 31.The snowflake ratings are for the Reveillon menu, not the restaurant in general. Dishes marked with the symbol » are my recommendations.
Clarence & Lefty’s Roast Beef Poor Boy
The first roast beef poor boy of my life came to me from the crusty old kitchen at Clarence and Lefty’s, itself a crusty kind of a joint on Almonaster at N. Johnson Streets in the Eighth Ward. My benefactor was my parrain and uncle, Billy Richard. A decade later, I wrote a review of the place and got a call from Uncle Billy, who reminded me that he was the one who made the introduction. Many years after that, Mrs. Lefty told me how she made the beef. The critical difference between her recipe and others I’ve seen was this instruction: “Don’t be afraid to use a lot of water. The beef should almost float.” It’s a pot roast, really.
6-8 lbs. beef chuck or round (preferably inside round)
1 medium onion, sliced thin
5 cloves garlic, sliced into quarters
3 Tbs. salt
1 cup standard barbecue sauce (not smoke-flavored)
1/2 cup Worcestershire sauce
2 bay leaves
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
1. With the point of a knife, punch slits into the top of the beef. Insert the quartered cloves of garlic.
2. Cover the bottom of a large Dutch oven with the sliced onions. Place the beef atop the onions. Scatter the salt, Worcestershire, and barbecue sauce over the beef.
3. Pour a half-gallon of water around (not over) the beef. Put the pan into the oven, uncovered, at 350 degrees, and roast until the top of the beef turns noticeably brown–about 45 minutes.
4. Turn the beef 180 degrees. Add enough water that the beef seems nearly weightless, as if it were about to float. Continue cooking, turning the beef about 90 degrees every 45 minutes, for three hours.
5. Check the doneness of the beef. It should have a blush of pink in the center–about 160 on a meat thermometer. If it’s not there, keep going, but know that the speed of the cooking will increase, so check it more often.
6. Remove the beef from the dutch oven onto a pan, to collect the juices. Pour the stock from the dutch oven into a large saucepan. Add the juices that come out of the roast. Add the bay leaves and bring the pan contents to a simmer. Cook until reduced to about one-quarter of what you started with–about six to eight cups of liquid. Strain.
7. Optional: Make a medium-dark roux with a half-cup each of flour and vegetable oil. When done, add about a half-cup of reduced stock to the roux and whisk until smooth. use this mixture to thicken the stock to gravy consistency.
8. Adjust the gravy with salt and pepper. Slice the roast beef as thinly as you can, and dip into the gravy before putting the beef onto one half of a mayonnaise-spread French bread sliced end to end. Spread the other side with mayonnaise and add the lettuce, tomatoes, and pickles. Put the whole sandwich into a preheated 450-degree oven until toasted. Eat with a root beer or a not-so-root beer.
Serves about 20-24.
Roast Beef Poor Boy @ Bear’s Grill & Spirits
The great roast beef poor boys achieve their allure one of two ways. Either they’re reminiscent of the best of your life, which probably includes the first one you ever had. (That, for me, was the style served in neighborhood bars.) Or they’re entirely original. Bear’s origins go back decades, mostly on the North Shore. The beef is thinly sliced and a shade on the dry side. However, the gravy more than fixes that (in fact, I always ask them, to take it easy on the jus). And the flavor that results is irresistible. It’s too big, of course. I can only eat half of a small one without stuffing myself. It’s the best roast beef on the North Shore, and one of the best in the area.
Bear’s Grill & Spirits. Old Metairie: 3206 Metairie Rd. 504-833-9226.
Metairie: 3309 Division St. 504-455-6613This is among the 500 best dishes in New Orleans area restaurants. Click here for a list of the other 499.
December 26, 2014
Days Until
New Year’s Eve–6
The First Day of Christmas
Today, various people gave their various loves a partridge in a pear tree, a song for the Christmas tree, a Japanese transistor radio, and a crawfish they caught in Arabi. I woke up this morning thinking about this song (which has till January 6 to run, even if you’re quite done with it already), and how I would write the words from the perspective of a New Orleans cook and eater. The results are below.
On the first day of Christmas I’d like to cook for you:
A filé duck-andouille gumbo.
On the second day of Christmas I’d like to poach for you:
Two eggs Sardou.
On the third day of Christmas I’ll sugar-dust for you:
Three beignets.
On the fourth day of Christmas I’d like to cut for you:
Four fourths of a muffuletta.
On the fifth day of Christmas I’d like to fry for you:
Five soft shell crabs!
On the sixth day of Christmas I’d like to roast for you:
Six char-grilled oysters.
On the seventh day of Christmas I’d like to flame for you:
Seven bananas Foster.
On the eighth day of Christmas I’d like to grill for you:
Eight links of sausage.
On the ninth day of Christmas I’d like to steam for you:
Nine cups of rice.
On the tenth day of Christmas I’ll slow-simmer for you:
Ten cups of red beans.
On the eleventh day of Christmas I’ll barbecue for you:
Eleven jumbo shrimp.
On the twelfth day of Christmas I’d like to dress for you:
A twelve-inch dressed hot roast beef poor boy.
This is the first day of Kwanzaa, a celebration of African heritage first celebrated in 1966. It runs through January 1, with glad tidings every day and gift exchanging on New Year’s day. The word Kwanzaa is from a Swahili phrase meaning “first fruits.” We who enjoy the unique pleasures of Creole cooking ought to note this holiday, regardless of our backgrounds. Without the African influence on our food, it would be nothing like it is, and not nearly as delicious.
Observances
Today is Boxing Day, a holiday in England and the Commonwealth (Australia, Canada, and a few other countries. It is traditionally the day on which servants were given their Christmas gifts. So it’s was the day the chefs and waiters got their bonuses. The origin of the name is not agreed upon, and none of the theories are interesting enough to go into.
Food Inventions
On this date in 1865, the coffee percolator won a patent for James H. Nason (sometimes noted as Mason). The percolator automates the task of pouring hot water over coffee grounds. It works by isolating a small amount of water near the heat source, so it will come to a boil quickly. When it does, the boiling forces the water up a tube to the top of the pot, where it spilled into a compartment filled with ground coffee. The water then percolates through the grounds to brew the coffee. The percolator has fallen into disrepute among coffee purists, who note that toward the end of the process brewed coffee is boiled as it cycles through the system. I think this effect actually adds something to coffee. But then again, I drink coffee and chicory, which coffee purists also decry.
Annals Of Food Writing
Today in 2005, a man who inspired me to search for fabulous, little-known restaurants passed away. He was a sixty-four-year-old comic strip character named Steve Roper. His serial adventure strip had been in newspapers since 1940. Roper was a magazine reporter and photographer who covered the tough stories, so he was always involved in high adventures. When I was about ten, one of the episodes intrigued me. Roper’s boss asked him to show the new fashion editor around the city and take her to dinner. The woman was beautiful and sophisticated, and was disdainful of Roper’s apparently rough lifestyle. Especially when Roper drove her to the back of a warehouse in a bad neighborhood. She was on the verge of panic when Roper knocked on the door. A maitre d’ in a tuxedo opened it up, welcomed Roper as a regular customer, and walked them through a spectacular dining room to the best table in the house, set with flowers and fine napery. Over the next few strips, the fashion editor was astonished by the food, service, and wine at this unheard-of location.
“Not too many people know about this restaurant,” said Roper. “And the management likes it that way.”
Then and there, I decided that the ultimate restaurant would be one that not only served great food very well, but which was not well known. I’ve looked for such places all my career, and taken delight in finding them. All because of Steve Roper.
More Career Influences
Today is also the birthday (1921) of Steve Allen, the first host of The Tonight Show and a major influence on my broadcasting style. As is the case with many early television stars, Steve Allen’s work is largely lost, so his genius is not widely realized. Hi-ho, Steverino. . . Another hero of mine came to an end today in 1954. The Shadow was the first radio drama I ever heard, when episodes from the 1940s reappeared on radio in the early 1960s. The stories about the man who could cloud men’s minds so they cannot see him grabbed my young imagination when I was ten or eleven.
Gourmet Gazetteer
Fork, Maryland is a suburban crossroads with a country feeling, eighteen miles northeast of downtown Baltimore. It’s named for the Gunpowder River, which forks into two waterways nearby. It’s an affluent area of impressive houses with large open lawns. A curiosity is that a former Nike missile launch pad left over from the earliest days Cold War is in the area. To wield a fork in Fork, go to the Sunshine Grill, right on Fork Road.
Edible Dictionary
mincemeat pie, n.–Usually made in the standard two-crust, nine-inch-diameter round form, a mincemeat pie is filled with a mixture of chopped fruits, almost always including apples. The fruit mixture is seasoned with aromatic spices like cinnamon, cloves, and mace, and often spiked with a bit of rum or brandy. It is of British origin, and is still popular around Christmastime. It dates back to medieval times, and was popular enough that by the 1600s Oliver Cromwell made a law against serving mince pie (its alternative name) it on Christmas Day–probably because of the alcohol content. Originally, mincemeat actually included meat. That practice has all but disappeared, although some recipes still call for beef suet to be used in cooking down the fruits. Butter is more common now.
Today’s Flavor
It’s Roast Beef Poor Boy Day. In many homes, prime rib is left over from the Christmas feast. Even the scraps of that are the makings of a great sandwich, to say nothing of the gravy. In the spirit of the season, we refrain from insisting that it be a poor boy sandwich. Philly cheese steaks, subs, hoagies, and French dips all qualify for fulfillment of your obligation on this day. However, much more about the New Orleans roast beef poor boy is in our Recipe section.
Unusual Foods
Remember eating emu? The big, flightless, ostrich-like bird appeared as a special on menus around town in the early 1990s. It’s a red meat, very low in fat, and seemed to have enough promise that emu farms were started by many people persuaded that it was soon to be a big business. It all collapsed on this day in 1997, when it was reported that emus were running around free in Texas, where many of the failed farms were. Problem: no taste, tough texture. I didn’t like any of the samples of it I tried. Didn’t any of these people eat the stuff first? Dishes made with emu and ostrich have been turning up on a few menus around town lately, but I don’t think they’re exactly taking off.
Speaking of exotic foods, on this date President Bill Clinton signed a measure banning the practice of capturing sharks, cutting off the fins, and throwing the now-helpless fish back into the sea. The fins were destined for Asian markets, mostly for shark’s fin soup. Which tastes like nothing to me.
Annals Of Food Writing
This is the birthday of Alan King, a stand-up comedian whose greatest popularity was in the 1960s through the 1980s. He wrote a book in 1991 with New York restaurant critic Mimi Sheraton, entitled Is Salami And Eggs Better Than Sex? It begins this way: “As life’s pleasures go, food is second only to sex. Except for salami and eggs. Now that’s better than sex, but only if the salami is thickly sliced.”
Music To Drink By
The song Escape–better known as The Pina Colada Song–is about a couple in an evaporating relationship. They find one another again through a personal ad, in which the guy asserts his liking for pina coladas, the taste of Champagne, and other first-date issues. It made Number One on the pop charts today in 1979. Rupert Holmes was the singer.
Food Namesakes
Elisha Cook, Jr., an actor who appeared in The Maltese Falcon, among other movies, was born today in 1902. . . Susan Butcher, a multiple winner of the Iditarod dog-sledding race in Alaska, hit the Big Trail today in 1954.
Words To Eat By
“It may not be possible to get rare roast beef, but if you’re willing to settle for well done, ask them to hold the sweetened library paste that passes for gravy.”–Marian Burros, food writer for the New York Times.
The Young Are So Advanced.
They must learn things like this from the TV food shows. In case you’re not up with this, the Maillard reaction is what you get when you brown (but not burn) the outside of a meat roast.
Click here for the cartoon.