So good. Crawfish are, without a doubt, one of my favorite things about living in New Orleans. I was able to run right down the street today around lunchtime and pick these up from a little neighborhood seafood joint, and then enjoy them (and the nearly 80 degree weather) in my courtyard. Couldn’t be more pleased…
Sometimes I can be at the grocery store, just picking up my milk and coffee and bananas and the like, and I can forget for just a split second that I live here, in New Orleans, in Louisiana. Then a quick glance at the freezer case snaps me right back to it…
It’s such a blessing to live here and be able to explore all the amazing little places you’d never find as just a visitor. They are as quirky and varied as our neighborhoods themselves, each with their own rhythms, menus, and customers/devotees. Luckily, though, you don’t have to actually live in a neighborhood to enjoy its restaurants. New Orleans is a small enough town that you can get anywhere pretty quickly, and the food is good enough that it’s always worth the trip.
Here in the Treme, we’ve got Lil’ Dizzy’s, with its spread of mouth-watering fried chicken, red beans and rice, and gumbo. I’ve found no livelier place to watch a Saints game than here. Everyone from the guy clearing your table to the women handling the checks at the register to the lady behind the weekend omelette station jumps and shouts so you know it’s ok for you to, too. In fact, they look at you funny if you don’t.
Mid-City/Bayou St. John folks love Parkway for its po-boys and so do I. Cross the Mississippi River over to the West Bank for some of the most delicious pho and Vietnamese food around. And in the Bywater, The Joint delivers up crazy good barbeque (to be a subject of a future post), Bacchanal has the most amazing courtyard and food and wine to match, and Satsuma Cafe does a taste bud right with its delicious sandwiches, fresh salads, made-to-order juices, and ever-changing daily specials.
I discovered Satsuma a few months ago and was immediately won over by the looks of the place. It’s a beautiful building, the walls filled with art from floor to ceiling, and a feel that’s welcoming and warm. Then I had their food and thought to myself, “I want to live right here in Satsuma. I ain’t never leaving, nuh uh.” I’ve had BLT sandwiches that included avocado paste and goat cheese so tasty they’ll make you want to cry. Their so-called “green eggs and ham” special featured scrambled eggs with shaved ham and pesto. So good.
I guess I am not alone in my love for the place, though, as it’s always always busy. But that makes me happy since I want it to be here forever. Oh, and The New York Times also featured it in a recent article and slideshow they did about new restaurants in the city since Katrina.
If you’re not from here and come for a visit, it’s worth searching out. You’ll fall in love, promise. And if you do live here and have never been, then, fool, whatchu waiting for?
… I have got a pepper plant that just won’t quit! Had I any actual gardening tips, I’d provide them, but I’m thinking it must be sheer luck. After taking the below photographs, I picked 16 peppers off the plant — 16! And it’s still just absolutely covered with them. I need to go pick some more peppers today so they’ll quit weighing the poor plant down. We’re making homemade salsa with them, which is delicious and spicy. We can barely keep up with the plant’s output, though. What a “problem” to have, eh?
“I got oranges and bananas…” “I got bell peppers, I got sweet potatoes…” “I got plums, I got blueberries….”
Imagine waking up every day to those words, chanted, dream-like from a loudspeaker outside, sounding a bit like the Muslim call to prayer. That’s what Mr. Okra brings to my life in addition, naturally, to all manner of fresh, delicious fruits and vegetables. I’d never heard of Mr. Okra until I moved here last fall, but he’s become one of my favorite phenomenons (’cause that is what he truly is) in all of the Big Easy.
Mr. Okra rides around the city selling produce to neighborhoods, mostly in mid-city and downtown. He sells in areas where it’s not always easy or convenient to find fresh produce. He announces his presence by calling out what he’s got that day in a distinctive, melodic rhythm using a loudspeaker on his truck. Check YouTube for videos of him and you can hear it for yourself. Trust me, it’s worth it. I get so happy, day after day, when I hear him coming, and even if I’m not buying anything that day, I’ll still run to the window to watch him and his brightly colored truck pass by.
Mr. Okra’s a New Orleans institution and legend, and as such, when his old pick-up truck broke down late last year, a bar on Frenchmen Street hosted a fundraiser to help Mr. Okra get back on his merry way. A Ford dealership donated a new truck for him, and after local artist Dr. Bob did his cheery magic on it, and after the back was modified to make racks for the fruit and veggies, Mr. Okra was back on his daily route, making us all so happy.
I took the below pictures on his first day back a few months ago. I was simply giddy when I heard his voice and ran out of the house as fast as possible to see him and his new truck. Only in New Orleans…
And when I say “little,” I mean it. This tiny tomato from the plant in my courtyard may only make up less than a bite of my salad tonight at supper, but the smile he (yes, I am assigning this itty bitty tomato a gender) brings me is huge! I mean, is that not the cutest little homegrown tomato you’ve ever seen? Hope he tastes as good as he looks.
The oldest oyster processor and distributor in the country, New Orleans’ own P&J, just announced that it’s going to have to start shipping in oysters from the West Coast. The 134 year-old company had to lay off some of its workers and is doing what it can to just hang on in the hopes that the oyster beds in the Gulf of Mexico recover. Other oyster processors around the city are experiencing the same thing, so Louisiana oysters will soon be a relic of the past here in the Big Easy, at least for a time. A horrible state of affairs, if you ask me.
So, to combat my sorrow and to fill my belly, I walked over into the Quarter today and enjoyed two dozen raw oysters, from the remaining P&J stock. I hope they aren’t my final ones ever.
Thanks, again, BP, you bastards.
Ordered a dozen, and got 18. Love that Nola generosity!
And, done!
Monster oyster!
18 just wasn’t enough, so here’s 6, er, 8 more.
A map/placemat depicting the oyster beds in the Gulf that P&J sources from. I took one home as a keepsake. The oysters we ate today were from area 7. And man, were they ever delicious.
Damn you, BP. Not only are you contaminating the Gulf, coating the wildlife with sludge, and putting fishermen out of business, but now you’ve gone and robbed New Orleanians of the best oyster poboys in the city. I’m talking about the ones from Parkway, of course. There’s nary an oyster to be found in the place, thanks to volatile and rising prices on the little bivalves. So, I had to make do with shrimp. Not the worst compromise in the world, but still, not oyster!
(I like how those three shrimp off to the side seem to be making a break for it. Not so fast, lil buddies…)
