Mayhaw Man

Thank you for the blessing, but no one is after my money and I have never had a desire to be a fireman. I have always identified with Heller's Yossarian more than any of Vonnegut's characters. It's a complex world for a casual guy like me.

I have the same problem. Maybe a twelve step group could help. "Hello. My name is Brooks and I am a worcestershireaholic" This stuff is a pretty good swig right out of the bottle. I reccomend it. I should never have to go work in the middle of the night. My posting quality goes right down the tube.

Exactly. What Jason said. Will worth the trip. A serious roadhouse with serious food. Seriously take some extra people. In this case-mo people, mo bettah.

Long day, perhaps? Yes it was. But my little offhand remark was not really that negative. What I meant was that those boys come pre-loaded with mud and other debris and could break a box of bowling pins just by looking at it. Nothing is safe with them around. They are a walking, moving, talking, eating, hurricane. I love em, but they are not too neat. Gumbo Manana.

What about Clancy's? Way uptown. Very good and dependable food. Very New Orleans. Nothing but locals and a few enlightened tourists. Many people think of it as the Uptown Galitoire's in terms of the clientele. Get the mussle appetizer and make them bring you some extra bread to soak up all of that delicious mussle liquor. I know that you said that they can get Italian in New York, but they can't get Mosca's. Sicilian Creole is a very limited get. Take a few of your friends along with your parents and order everything on the menu (it's served family style) and you will not be sorry. Just don't plan on getting too close to your patients the next day as the garlic will follow you for a couple of days. Upperline is another place that is pretty much a sure thing. Great food, great service, an interesting atmosphere (Joanne Clevenger, the owner, has a great collection of eclectic art and is as charming a host as you will ever come across in New Orleans). Recent reports have continued to give it high marks. As far as going across the lake, La Provence is a great place. Kris now has a little b and b in his compound and it is a very cool place to spend the night if you happen to want to do that. The amuse of whatever the hell he has made into pate for the day is worth the whole trip. Get anything that says rabbit. Provincial cooking lends itself well to game and he seems to be particularly good with rabbit. As far as brunch goes, you might have to hope for more help. I had Brennans last Sunday and while it was very nice and well done and all of that, the bill is still a stunner for a couple of eggs and a few drinks. I still say there is much better value elsewhere, I just don't know where. I do love Commander's Palace for week day lunch. That may well be (as I and many others have said before) the best fine dining lunch deal on the planet. Order the bread pudding soufflee when you sit down and enjoy some of those tasty twenty five cent blue martinis while you soak up the cool atmosphere. On the other hand, I could go to Peristyle once a week and be perfectly happy, so maybe you should think about another visit. I also agree with you about Nola (although I really believe that Emeril's is to notch and if it had somebody else's name on it it would get a better rap across the board). One more thing. I know it goes against convention, but in the neighborhood of GW Fins I would much rather eat at Redfish Grill (another great weekday lunch spot also) or Mike Anderson's (Mike's has really good food and a great line up of soups and it is often overlooked. It's been there for twenty years, they must be doing something right). Good Luck. I am sure that you wil get lots more opinions than my highly non scientific one.

I'm with you on that one. We have similar rules. Bacon and butter are pretty much all the condiments you need to perk up any dull dish or add more enjoyment to a favorite. ( I sound a great deal like Betty Furness, I better go take a pill. Too much eGullet and fifties tv advertising.)

I have recieved a number of pm's in the last few days from potential revelers who would like to meet up during the weekends of the Jazz Fest. I am all for it. It would be nice to put a face on some of the people I have "virtually met" and am pretty much available every day for anything-anytime 24-7 for 10 days. My krewe, The Jazz Fools Social Aid and Pleasure Club, is available to help out with advice and fun. You guys can tag along or lead. We're pretty easy and tend to disentigrate and reassemble many times during the day (hell, we disentegrated for years in our various personal lives and got it back together-so why not for one day?) How about this for you first weekenders? Let's set a spot to meet on the first Saturday and we can figure out what to eat and do it in groups (much like locusts roaming the Fairgrounds in search of the best offerings). I propose for the first weekend meeting at the side of the Fais Do DO stage at the Web Cam spot for about 12:30. It's a little geeky but it is a good meeting spot and we can get our picture taken for posterity by the JazzCam. Then we'll eat and then we'll dance and then we'll eat some more and dance even more. Later we will go bathe (not together, although I'm not ruling anything out ) and meet up at a show for some serious late night revelry. The bowling alley might be the spot (I am thinking that the Iguanas are on the bill first Saturday, but I could be wrong), but I won't know until the music listings are out this week. If it goes good and I am not dead, in jail, or out of money we can do the same for the second weekend for those who are there. I will go ahead and link this to those that pm'd me and hopefully some others will rise to the occasion. All you need to have fun at the Jazz Fest is "Motion, Rythm, and Instinct". Actually that is all you need pretty much all of the time, if you ask me. How about it? You guys in? EDITED TO SAY-This is not my deal, my town, or my festival. Anyone with any other opinions or ideas should weigh in. I take great joy in teaching people about our part of the world but I have learned as much from tourists as they have EVER learned from me. Got a plan? I'm with you if it's fun and doesn't keep me in jail past noon the next day!

Disaster strike The Blog-Film at 11. Anyway, after that dramatic entrance I will tell you about dinner. I still had boys at home tonight plus an extra adult guest (I love having two women in the house. Just kind of brightens the place up as opposed to a bunch of young teenage and adolescent boys who don't brighten anything up ever . I had to stay at work until 5 therefore the best laid plans went to hell in a handbasket but as they say mother is the neccessity of invention so I bucked up and got with the program before someone could have another issue. Can you tell I spent my afternoon in a meeting withe meeting talk abounding? Yuck. It's a miracle anything ever gets done in this country with all of these meetings going on. So I fell back on a family standby-Jewella. This recipe pretty much qualifies as noodles and meat casserole except that it is made with exceptional ingredients and that the basic recipe is one that my mother got from her mother and aunt. It can actually be pretty damn good and it was tonight. I will put the actual recipe in recipe gullet because it honestly is worth taking a crack at if you have to feed a bunch of people. Brown 1.5 lb lean ground beef and 1.5 lb. good quality sausage (tonight I used grass fed ground sirloin from my neighbors who helps me out with some beef and I just help him out and I used venison sausage that is extremely good (probably 40% pork) and not too sagey). Throw in 1 large yellow onion, 1 red bell pepper, 1 green bell pepper(all medium chopped) , 5 cloves garlic, minced, salt, black pepper, ripped fresh basil, oregano, rosemary to taste, a quart of decent tomato sauce after the browning is done (I used homemade, I am running out of that too-summer can't come soon enough for me). While you are busy with that cook 1 lb. of macaroni shells (I like the big ones my kids like the little ones so I use medium ) and cook and cool them. Once the meat mixture is browned you can throw in the macaroni and mix well. Ladle into 13X9 pyrex pans (dividing mixture evenly) Tonight I topped it with a mixture of yellow rat cheese (the kind that comes in the red wax wrapper and is like 1/16 of a wedge) bought at Sams and some Cabot's Cheddar. This was mixed well together and spread evenly on top. The casserole is heaved into the oven and baked at 350 until it bubbles (20 min. or so). It is honestly delicious and I don't apologize for serving it, ever, My boys love it and adults like it too. I especially like the passage below this recipe entry in my Mother's cookbook that she wrote and published for her children and her daughter's in law (all boys there too-no girls Maybe that's why my brothers and I all cook ). I am so glad to have that book. It was one of the nicest things I have ever received from anyone. Anyway here is what she wrote: "Mom's oldest sister, Jewel, brought this recipe to us in Bastrop, LA during the war. In those days casseroles were rarities and we thought that this was the best thing that we had ever tasted. When your Aunt Florence moved to Jackson her friends called it 'Florencini'. " Along with this we had butterbeans I found in the freezer last night (I though that I had run out. It was a joyous moment when I saw those little green devils hiding behind the popsicles) and steamed broccoli with a little lemon and soy melted butter. Dessert was more cake from last night as I couldn't get to anything tonight. I should say that I walked in the house at about 5:15 and served at 6:45. I am nothing if not a short order cook. A little longer than Rachel Ray but I was making bigger portions and had no shortcuts ready. I will insert the photos in a little while as soon as I can get on the computer with the software (it seems to be tied up in a homework project at the moment). I am not working on Wed. (although I have a newspaper column due tomorrow at noon, so I might be busy in the morning) so I am going to make a big gumbo and at the same time cook a brisket (maybe a butt too, it depends on what I can find at the butcher) on the pit. It should be fairly interesting for everybody and I can freeze some stuff so I will have food for kids during Jazz Fest. Our world stops during the Jazz Festival and stuff like kids and work had better be able to go on auto pilot as Mommy and Daddy can still be totally irresponsible when they set their minds to it.

Pig sizing symantics aside- I can help, but you might as well get started with egci. A handy little tool from the friendly folks at eGullet. You got questions? They got answers! How to Roast a Pig Now after you read this we can talk about Cajun Microwaves and such. I am not, at all, an expert in this fine art but a number of my friends think that it is the most fun thing you can do with a pig. I will see if I can find an expert to advise me and help you out.

If you go back and look up a classic prohibition era homebrew recipe (one with Blue Ribbon Brand Malt Syrup)you will find that they all use bread yeast. While it kicks off like gangbusters it is not particularly alcohol tolerant and will die when you get up around 5%, so the brew tends to be very sweet. I would think that bread yeast would work well in soda for this same reason. Champagne yeasts will be more alcohol tolerant (duh ) and will give you a longer fermentation. I am not sure what it will do to the flavor profile however. If you have a good homebrew shop in your area you might ask them what kind of LIQUID YEASTS that they keep in stock and what might lend itself well to carbonating softdrinks. You might also contact Wyeast Labs. They are great people and I would imagine that if you call them up that they would be willing to give you advice (especially if you invest in a little of their fine liquid yeast).

It's a great record. Someone who is moving nicely from rock star back to student and interpreter. Maybe they met at the Crossroads at some point, because some of the stuff he does with those old tunes is pretty amazing. They sound so fresh, but at the same time sound like they might be sampled from a Lomax field recording. We eat all kinds of rice. Long grain, basmati, jasmine, Texmati, risotto, sushi rice (I have gotten to where I really like sushi rice as a snack-especially that Lundberg stuff from California-it's a little pricey (actually alot pricey) but it is really good when made as sushi rice (vinegar, sugar, etc.) and served with a little soy or even better when a little Salsa Lizano on top). I have a very low tech rice cooker that works great (no fuzzy logic, but I don't buy fuzzy logical rice so it seems to work o.k. ) although it doesn't keep the stuff very well like some of the more expensive models. On the other hand it only has one switch and my kids can (and do) operate it. I took a sharpie and wrote the rice/h20 on the side for various kinds of rice (Martha wouldn't do that, but she doesn't live at my house ). With Gumbo and beans and stuff it is mainly long grain, Louisiana grown. Soups or anything light probably is going to get a more aromatic grain like jasmine, texmati, or basmati. We have risotto with some kind of pork or beef probably once a week (current fave mixture is risotto with onions, garlic, red bell pepper and toasted pecans using chicken stock as the liquid base). My kids scarf it up and that is pretty much all I am shooting for most nights. There is something very satisfying about making risotto. Maybe it is just seeing all of that liquid disappear. I don't know, but I do like making it. Edited because I can't type (pretty sad for semi empolyed writer, actually )

Thanks for all of the kind responses. In one more non food related note (although music and food are directly related to the pleasure and enjoyment levels in my life and that of my family) lately in the heavy rotation at my house havve been two records that I can't turn off. Click on these links, buy the records, and help buy yogurt for our many contributors. Eric Clapton-Me and Mr. Johnson and The Flatlanders - Wheels of Fortune The Clapton record is probably the best thing that he has ever done as far as one grouping of song interpretations go. I made a cd with Robert Johnson's versions followed by Eric Clapton's versions paired together. The effect can be pretty bone chilling at times. The Flatlanders record is just another Flatlander's record (which is to say that it is a domn fine piece of work). The version of Midnight Train will make you drive your car 100 miles and hour and drink whiskey from the bottle. A truly great song. Jimmy Dale Gilmore has an earlier cover on one of his records, but it doesn't do the job like this version. Now back to the Food Channel- Going to the produce place this afternoon to pick up a few gumbo needs. I will take some pictures. It is a pretty remarkable place considering it exists in a town with 2500 people and the road it is on goes to nowhere in particular (although you can get there from here ) and these people make a living selling whatever they can get that is fresh and good. Nice folks. They boil peanuts, sell preserves, sell green tomatoes by the lug if you need them (you have to order), have a guy that sells shrimp when they are in and good, and will get weird requests if needed (for example they got me ten pounds of small okra to put up into pickles last summer). A good business totally driven by customer service. I know they don't get rich at it, but I'm glad that they are there.

I seem to recall from the "Music in the Kichen" thread that you have a pretty encyclopedic range of musical tastes. Do you ever listen to stuff by McMurtry's son, James? It's damned near perfect, some of it. Yeah, the guy's pretty pissed off most of the time, but his lyrics are so well crafted and, man, can he play guitar. I'm diggin' your blog. I lived in Metairie when I was a kid and have yet to get back to LA, but your blog is giving me one more reason to plan a trip. I've seen a few Vs of geese headed back north here in Vermont, but we're still a long way from fresh tomatoes. Blog on. Levelland is currently one of my favorite songs on the rotation at KGSR in Austin. I love that line " Flatter than a tabletop, Makes you wonder why they stopped? Wagon musta lost a wheel or they lacked ambition one" R.E. Keene covered it last year and I actually thought that it was his song, but the radio station was getting so many calls from J M fans that they started playing the other version with a disclaimer. It has been pretty funny. Singer/Songwriter fans can be a pretty demonstrative bunch. Incidentally, click on KGSR and click on listen. It's easy and one of the most diverse and interesting stations on the web. You get local music listings in Austin also and if that doesn't make you jealous (I live in New Orleans and I get that way, so it must be terrible if you live in Dubuque or somewhere )

I agree that he left some places out, but on the other hand he included a few that would surely be over looked by locals (no matter how clued in they are) and tourists alike. I've never heard of "Crabby J's" or "Fay's Takeout and Honey Whip Doughnuts" but I promise I will be going to both places in the next couple of weeks. I would go to "Fays" just on the strength of the name of the place alone. I will probably get a "honey whip" to go along with the gumbo. I wonder if people dunk them in the soup? Another place not on the list is "Lagniappe Too" in New Iberia. I thought that that light brown gumbo was delicious and a fine example of that type.

I wanted to thank Alex for the reference to PIXresizer. It is handy, simple, and free. Even a luddite like me can resize and post pictures with a minimum of trouble. All of this was discussed in this thread located in "Site Tips and Techniques". It is freeware and it will run on crappy computers as it doesn't require much in the way of computing power. Such a deal!

Tasso is just another example of the superiority of the pig over all others in the animal kingdom. Breakfast this morning was a bit unusual for us-there was some. We made french toast for the boys and their friend and had fresh made Strawberry Smoothie mad with local strawberries from Ponchatoula, LA. Right now they are selling for ten bucks a flat so we are eating them all of the time. Eggs, brown sugar, a little milk, and mexican vanilla for the base and some thick sliced sally lunn for the bread. We used our big electric griddle to cook it (I love that thing- my stove has one in the middle of it, but it is not nearly as convenient and does not cook as evenly). I got it on sale at Target a while back and it was really cheap. Super handy. Lunch today for everybody will be sandwiches left over from last nights pork loin on mini po boy rolls from Leidenheimer's Bakery. Incidentally, for those of you that have not yet paid off Jason and still want a sandwich for an avatar-there is a great po boy screen saver on this site. Lunches also had more sliced strawberries, chee wees, and a handful of pistachios that magically appeared in a large jar on my counter this weekend. I have no idea where they came from. Leaving your house unlocked can be a good thing sometimes, I guess. Chicken and Andouille Gumbo for a crowd tonight.

Snowangel, I was just thinking about you. I was outside feeding the cats (actually more like the coons, but it is supposed to be cats) and I heard a very large flock of geese going overhead (they winter here). They were headed North and it crossed my mind that Spring is finally here where I live and that those Geese must be hauling it up North for you "warmth challenged" denizens of the prairie. You know, when you are eating those tomatoes in August that they will be better than ours in August. We get a spring and early summer crop and then it gets too hot for the blooms to set (average daytime high around 95F in July and August). We replant in mid to late August and if you have any kind of luck at all have tomatoes coming out in October and up pretty close to Thanksgiving.

Brett Anderson, the Restaurant Critic for the New Orleans Times Picayune put together two really nice articles about Gumbo. The first is about Gumbo in it's many guises and the second is about where to eat it. This work is important to what we are and what we do down here and the guy deserves some serious credit for really doing his homework. For those of you that think of Gumbo as just a flour based soup and don't really get what the big deal is, these articles might help. And for you potential diners, he breaks down some of my favorite bowls (including Joe's Dreyfuss Store in Livonia, LA-the most worthwhile out of the way drive that you will ever make for a bowl of soup-I promise-hell, call me up. I'll take you there and prove it) into their brackish essence. Read both of these if you are at all interested in this subject, as it would be hard to do better work in a food section-newspaper format. Kudos to Brett. Nice work Buddy. Bowl of Wonder Beauty in a Bowl-20 Great Bowls and Where to Get em.

And in contrast to my caffeinated friend up North, here is the scene on the way out of my back door heading towards the gate. That is a very, very old climbing type of rose (single layered pink blooms) on the left and a cherry in bloom hanging over the top of the photo. That is a large mimosa by the gate that will soon be dripping it's messy flowers everywhere. I like the tree, but it is hell on car paint. Those flowers stick like glue balls to the paint on cars. And on another note, not really food related. I am a reader. I read everything I can get my hands on that interests me in any way (books, periodicals, newspapers, cereal boxes, billboards, eGullet, Jinmyo-anything) and I mow through books like Sherman through Georgia (he could have gone a little lighter on the burning thing, but that's a battle for another day ). I just finished one that I loved. I am a reader of information and rarely get sucked up in the emotional side of things, but I highly reccomend this to anyone looking for a good read. It's one of those things that just makes the whole thing seem better (whatever that means). Google on the book, the reviews sound just as dumb as my explanation, but the general consensus is that there is "something about this book". If you like Tom Robbins and you like Larry McMurtry and ever wondered what a combo of the two might be like, this is probably it. Anyway, if you order it through the nice folks at Amazon with this link Fat Guy and Jason can continue to keep this thing operating. The Blue Moon Circus

It snowed here twice in the last twenty years. Once the year after we got married (I wanna say just before Christmas in 84, but some New Orleanian may have to step in and correct me-and once in 95 or so really late in the spring, I remember this because it killed all of the azalea blooms. Snowed all night and was gone by lunch). In North Louisiana up in the Delta where I grew up it actually snows for real every once in a while when that jet stream thing dips down low enough. There is something extremely forlorn and lonely about dead cotton stalks sticking up out of the snow. It just never looked right. The only hill around (and I mean the only hill-the Mississippi Delta is one of the flattest places on the face of the Earth) was the levee at the river. That's where we had to go if we wanted to slide. The highest point in the whole state is only 535 ft. and that is all the way on the other side of the state. There are not many champion mountain climbers from Louisiana, but we have some great swim teams.

As I was standing in a dining room chair to take the photos of tonight's meal, a couple of the boys walked through and just stopped and stared slackjawed at me for a couple of seconds. They then proceeded to start telling my oldest son Miles what a weirdo his Dad was. "Does he always stand in chairs and take pictures of his meals?" " He must really love pork and peas." Also, I found myself wishing for Jason and his "ring of fire" camera tonight as I was doing this. Making a plate look interesting for a camera is harder than it looks, have we ever had a food photographer on egullet for a q and a? There are a couple of really good ones in New Orleans (Toby Armstrong comes to mind) that might be interested. I would think that might make for some interesting conversation.

Dinner tonight was not exactly what I had planned, but it turned out pretty swell anyway. I got home from work and we had some extra kids (apparently I have one of them for a couple of days so tommorrow night will be big pot of gumbo (chicken and andouille) night for the week) and everybody was going to starve by the time I got ettouffee ready for a crowd, so plan B ruled. I had some pork loins that Robin had picked up at Sam's yesterday (bargain price, never miss, I love em) I salted and peppered them and browned them in evoo (seriously searing them, hot as hell pan turning just once per side, 4 turns total). Ran them into the oven in the same pan for about twenty minutes @375F. Pulled them out to rest and deglazed the pan with some PORK STOCK that I had thawed out for that purpose. Sliced into medallions and ladled on a little of the rich pan juice. This was served with baked potatoes (which we almost never have, we eat rice four or five days a week), and purple hull peas that were put up last July at the height of the pea season (we did two bushels and will be out before we get more in early to mid summer-we eat alot of peas around here). The peas were cooked with a hunk of sliced tasso, garlic cloves, a tabasco pepper (out of the plant on my porch) and a little crushed black pepper. At serving they were topped with green tomato relish (running out of that too, can't wait for summer to get here). Sliced and salted and peppered tomato straight outta the garden (not mine, a neighbor who starts them in December in a hothouse and transplants them in the spring, but boy are they good). Ripe, juicy, kinda tart. Man oh man- it beats the grocery store any day of the week any time of year! Salad was mixed baby greens (the bag kind, they were pretty good-we eat alot more salad in the winter thanks to that packaging miracle. I used to hate fooling with salads for an average meal) with mandarins and artichoke hearts. Dressing was a balsamic vinagarette my wife made (the vinegar is awesome, but of undetermined origin as my sister in law (Mrs. Gotbucks) hauled it back from Italy and repackaged it for me (she's good like that, I got pretty lucky in general with the inlaw situation). It was apparently hideously expensive but as far as I am concerned totally worth it, rich, kinda thick, slightly spicy, delicious. It was also free hence my insane use of it in salad dressings. Oh yeah, peach pound cake for dessert. No pictures though. Trust me -it looks like pound cake with peaches in it. The recipe is in recipe gullet somewhere. It's really good and you can do it ok with frozen peaches, but in the middle of the summer with fresh ones it is sublime. I made a nice thick peach glaze to go on top and BAMMED it with some powdered sugar. COme to think of it, I will go take a picture and insert it. It looked pretty cool.

You missed your big chance. I can think of no better fare for car bound youngsters (some incarcerated in car seats, no doubt). The opportunities for throwing mooshy peanuts and their shells around your probably otherwise semi clean vehicle are the kind of moments that kids talk about for years. "Hey - Remember the time going to Gramma's when we trashed Dad's Car? That was GREAT! He was really mad."

Like the man said: It ain't bragging if you can do it.

Community has a chain of shops in South Louisiana that are really my preferred shop. CC's (as the shop is known) pull a decent shot of espresso and the beans are reasonably fresh. The CC's on Royal St. in the French Quarter is right down from my wife's apt. and is one of my favorite early morning spots when we are in the city. It is quiet and far enough in the back of the Quarter that the tourists don't find it. The pastries are also quite good and come from a couple of different sources. And I'm with you on the chicory thing. As my father once said on this subject, " If I wanted to put boiled acorns in my coffee I would do it myself". CC's