We moved to better digs (and no surprise, more expensive digs) at the hotel provincial on Chartes Street. But even here, we were awakened at 2’am or so by a drunken cackle. Seems unavoidable in the french quarter. Room 515 was in an old building that used to be a warehouse. It reminded us of a room we stayed at in Florence – high ceiling, huge, old world furnishings, elegant and a little odd. We liked it. our friends ended up in even stranger digs. they had their own two story condo that is normally someone’s home. again, odd.
We had coffee at CC’s Community coffee on Royal then popped into the central grocery but skipped getting the mufaletta because it wasn’t lunch time. We visited a very good new contemporary art gallery called M Gallery not far from our hotel, then took the st. Charles streetcar (which was a bus ride initially) to Tulane to see our nephew, a happy sophomore there. Ate at cafe ferete. Cute place, so so food. After a swim in the refreshingly cool water of the charming courtyard pool at our hotel, we ate at trendy couchon restaurant – oysters, porkcheek, short ribs,pulled pork with crackling and turnips and pickled peaches. Definitely different. Now taking our chances with frontier airlines. We appear to be leaving. So maybe this flight won’t be cancelled.
Category Archives: Louisiana
cc’s community coffee, central grocery, couchon, Tulane! Hotel provincial
Filed under airfare, Louisiana, New Orleans, Uncategorized
Lowernine.org., garden district, camellia grill, boucherie
Frenchman street is almost empty on this Saturday morning as I blog from the worn balcony of the Frenchman hotel but some public works guy has chosen to use some very noisy machinery 7:30 a,m. We saw a lot of NOLA yesterday starting with a tour of the Lower Ninth Ward. Seven years after Katrina, the area has far from recovered, which is shameful. lowernine.org is a nonprofit that is rebuilding houses, using volunteer labor including many people from other countries. Our tour was very low-key. A smart young woman originally from Wisconsin sat in the passenger seat of our rental car and guided us to the pertinent sites. Far better and more appropriate than crawling though the area in a tour bus. We gave her a donation that goes to the organization.
We stopped for coffee and a homemade pop tart at Satsuma, a cafe in the Bywater; had a fun lunch sitting at the counter at the Camellia Grill in Uptown (loved the jocular waiters In their white shirts and black bow ties serving up huge omelettes with fries smothered in chili and burgers with grilled onions. on to the Garden District to soak up the architecture and then a stroll down Magazine Street, popping in a few shops. We may have had our best dinner yet at Boucherie in Uptown, located In a tiny house. fantastic food and ambiance and service. Will return.
Filed under Louisiana, New Orleans
Cafe des Amis – Cajun charmer
good thing I booked a table at cafe des Amis in breaux bridge last night because the place was packed…on a Wednesday night no less. The music and the food were a big draw. We had a front table right in front of a three piece Cajun band that played for almost two hours straight while diners danced expertly. Great scene in cozy old storefront cafe. The food was excellent …the best crabcakes ever and a very good shrimp étouffée. I shared a chocolate pecan pie slice with franc and a 29 year French Moroccan lawyer we met on our swamp tour. Fun night!
I was less impressed tonight by maurepas foods in Nola’s Bywater neighborhood. Interesting looking place in emerging arty area but food a bit precious and we ended up spending way too much for way too little food. I had to beg for some bread and the waiter produced four pieces of bread, each the size of a silver dollar. struck me as stingy.
much better was the jazz fund band nearby at Vaughn’s, a small club in the Bywater that rocked as people danced to the jubilant horns of Kermit Ruffins and the BBQ Swingers. fantastic energy and sound. this Detroit girl couldn’t get enough!
Filed under Louisiana, New Orleans
Leblanc swamp tour, Mcgees landing, lafayette la.
Norbert Leblanc did not disappoint. He turned out to be a wirey, youthful 77-year-old Cajun who knew the swampy Lake Martin inside and out. He could spot an alligator poking its head out of the water or two turtles on a log from several feet away. As we motored along in his small six seat swamp boat, weaving through a maze of elegant Cyprus and tupelo gum trees draped with spanish moss, he pointed out egrets, herons,cormorants, and hawks and regaled us with stories. We stopped inside a strand of trees so he could serve us some moonshine in small plastic cups and show us photos of his alligator conquests, including an 800 pound one he somehow managed to capture. He also pulled out a worn copy of national geographic to show us some photos of himself from a long ago story. There was one other passenger besides the three of us, a French Moroccan young woman from Paris who spoke English but also shared some French conversation with Norbert. We were out on the water for two hours and thoroughly enjoyed the beauty and peace.
Great value too… For $20 per person.
We landed at Mcgees landing for lunch, high atop a levee in nearby Henderson, overlooking a broad expanse of the Atchafalaya Swamp, a seemingly endless stretch of water and wetlands, a perfect perch for watching birds and the occasional boat.russ and I had our first crawfish .. We were underwhelmed. They were sort of tiny dry shrimp in a red peppery spice. Expensive too…about $18. But glad we tried and we enjoyed the backwoods feel of the place and chatting with the waitress.
We drove into Lafayette for a quick look around, finding the Blue Moon Saloon which we may return to for music tonight. But our little cottage by the lake beckoned so after picking up some butter toffee coated pecans and a satsuma (other local products we had to try)we happily returned lakeside.
Filed under Louisiana
Laura plantation, breaux bridge la., Cajun country cottages: Cajun country
I am sitting on the porch of a pretty little Cajun country cottage overlooking a small muddy brown-green lake bordered by dense trees. The frogs are chirping, the birds chirping, two bright green salamanders are climbing the mustard colored wood frame cottage. So much to report:
Laura Plantation, one of the first plantations on the river road heading out of Nola, turned out to be lovely and understated (compared to the grand Oak Alley Plantation nearby), a horizontal one story creole mansion with a wide porch set on a long swath of green lawn dotted with huge ancient oaks. surprisingly, this plantation was run by a series of women, all tough cookies from the sound of it. The tour was heavy on unvarnished history (notably the slavery discussion) which we appreciated.
B&C Seafoods was just east of the plantation so we had some local delicacies for lunch, most of it deep fried. boudin balls (deep fried balls of a creamy sort of sausage) a local delicacy, were tasty. I had the crab equivalent…a crab cake which came with hush puppies and fries. Francine was talked into having alligator burger. Not bad. Kinda dry.
Cajun country cottages, turned out to be a very good pick. And a nice change after our cramped quarters in Nola. It’s a two bedroom cottage with a big living room, eat in Kitchen and this lovely porch with a swinging bench overlooking the lake, (where I am now. ) we like it so much that we decided to eat in last night after picking up some locally made Cajun pasta sauce at the Heberts market in downtown breaux bridge. Nice and spicy!
Filed under Louisiana
Herbsaint in NOLA?..Yuki jazz, preservation hall
I was second guessing my choice of restaurant when we walked over to Herbsaint in the central biz district of Nola for dinner last night because that’s what tends to happen in a city like this with so many fantastic dining options. I even was second guessing the entree I choose seconds after selecting it because the menu was so enticing. All for naught. We had one of the best meals I can remember. The ambiance was low key, not too hip or snooty, the servers knowledgeable and confident about the offerings. I was looking for something relatively light, fearing that my stomach will not tolerate days of rich southern food. So I picked the entree of the day which was speckled trout served with risotto seasoned with satsumas and tempora fried scallions. It was wonderful. I wish I could cook fish that successfully. It had flavor and moisture, while my efforts tend to produce dull and dry. The server coaxed me into abandoning my eating light pledge at dessert time and he was right. The malted milk chocolate mousse with creme anglaise, which I shared with F. Was unlike any chocolate mousse I have had, it looked like a tiny black breast, with a creamy shell of dark chocolate and then light less sweet mouse and anglaise inside. Sublime.
On our walk backmto Frenchman street we stopped to talk to people inline at preservation hall and learned we can book fix on line, for $30, double the regular price but it guarantees you a seat. We stopped at a jazz bar on Frenchman street called Yuki that was not your classic jazz scene. Most of the musicians were Japanese, including a woman on drums and keyboard. An old black and white Japanese film was projected onto the bar’s brick wall while they played. Fun crowd including a young woman I met from Istanbul. I love hour people just sauntered in, had a seat or in the cae of one young black guy, borrowed a trumpet and started blowing, very well.
Filed under New Orleans
The French quarter by day and night
I see why people come to new Orleans in October. The weather is glorious and there is more of the same to come. As advertised, our hotel, the historic Frenchmen hotel is funky. The best feature is the courtyard where I am sitting now, beside a tiny pool (I forgot my suit) and hot tub bordered tightly by two-story wood frame buildings with balcony catwalks,painted pink with blue trim. Hard not to yell “steella” from the balcony. This is the best part about the hotel…plus the price $169 for our loft with doublebed and sofabed. The sofabed is the worst part…the mattress feels more like a web of wire springs. I put the cushions atop it, which helped. The location is good and not. Perfect for visiting the music clubs along Frenchman street but as I feared, pretty noisy. Even with ear plugs I could hear the faint sound of horns, but hey, it’s new Orleans. Some partiers even gathered around 3 a.m….on a Monday morning no less. You have to admire their energy and party hearty spirit.
Last night we did the obligatory walk down bourbon street which was particularly rowdy thanks to a saints game. We far prefer Royal and Chartes streets, with their elegant balconied buildings and antique shops and galleries. The city is a visual feast. We had coffee at a nearby bohemain coffee house that seemed to be a local favorite , Envie, after having the obligatory chicory coffee and beignets at cafe du monde last night. We wandered through the flea market, discovered the French farmers market was closed due to a water problem (lots of repairs going on here, mainly the roads. Not sure if it’s Katrina related.) we also visited st. Louis cemetery #1′ where Russ was excited to find the above ground tomb of a legendary chess master, paul Morphy. We tried to eat at Luizza’s by the tracks, but it was closed due to a power outrage so we had gumbo,and po-boys at another famous old neighborhood spot in mid city, Mandinas, which was very good with lots of character. There is a plaque about 12 feet from the ground showing how high the floodwaters of Katrina rose. Glad it survived. We took the canal streetcar bAck which was fun. It suddenly stopped midway and we had to transfer to a city bus due to track construction.
Filed under New Orleans, Uncategorized
More New Orleans restaurant recommendations
Everyone I talk to who has spent time in New Orleans has her own recommendations of the best, classic New Orleans restaurants to eat and only seldom do I see overlap from one list to the other, which means I need A LOT MORE TIME in New Orleans than we’ll actually have during our trip next month. But here’s another list of impassioned recommendations – this one from my hair stylist who used to live in NOLA:
Filed under DINING, New Orleans
fantastic recommendations for new orleans!
Given how packed with tourists New Orleans promises to be when we visit in October, I’m not sure I want to share these excellent recommendations for where to eat and hear music (they come from a friend of my stepdaughter’s who lives there) but duty calls:
Filed under New Orleans
New Orleans Restaurants cont’d: dad weighs in
BRENNAN’S STARS WITH DUFF GOLDMAN
My dad weighs in with some restaurant recommendations for NOLA: (One of which we went to when I was last in New Orleans in around 1989 – Commanders Palace.)
Haven’t been to New Orleans in ages, but do remember Brennans for breakfast as being a classic…go late at night and have breakfast. Also remember eating oysters bienville which I haven’t seen anywhere else. Also, if it still exists, Commanders Palace in the garden district was beautiful.
> http://www.commanderspalace.com/
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>> http://www.brennansneworleans.com/ (see foto above)
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Filed under New Orleans
TakeBetsywithyou 