Month: May 2019

I’ve been wondering about this place. What was the attraction? Why was it still open? I think the answer is economy. Nice diner style burger, fries, and a drink for ten dollars even. Just a flattop grill, a couple of fryers, a reach in cooler and freezer and a counter to put the cash register and drink machine on. This place is pretty much the very definition of no frills. The burger was good. I read a couple of decent reviews about the fried seafood poboys, but I’ve pretty much seen what I had to see. If I worked right next to the place, I might hit it every other week or so, just because the food is good for the price–same way when I worked at Chimes and needed something different, I’d walk over to Roul’s Deli right down the street. The burger at Roul’s is better, but I think with this kind of place it is location, location, location and price, price, price.

This one is super quick, super easy, and super summer featuring yellow squash, shallots, and shrimp. I was able to pick up everything I needed at Calandro’s. Got it home, chopped up the squash and sliced the shallots, tossed them in the small wok pan with EVO and real butter, dusted the whole thing with Tony’s and black pepper, plus a little sage (you can take the seasoning any direction you want really) and once they softened up, added the shrimp to finish things off. This works well with andouille or ground beef or pork or lamb–anything works with summer squash because it is a flavor sponge. My mom used to make this all the time with canned shrimp and yellow onion and we all loved it. Very quick, uncomplicated, and yes, very healthy (when you use fresh shrimp).

I can’t believe I missed this painting of the original location on Lake Street by campus (LSU) on my first couple of trips to the Rocco’s on Drusilla. This is the original store located underneath the Chimes Street Washateria around twenty five years ago. After digging into the bbq beef poboy, I had a lot of confidence in the philly style and the roast beef and gravy and neither disappointed. I got the roast beef with gravy, swiss and raw onions. Magnificent. The philly came with provolone and grilled peppers and onions. The onion strings were good and crisp and fresh, and it’s always nice to be able to get a bottle of Barq’s with your meal. Still got a ways to go before I travel the whole Rocco’s menu, but I’m game. Looking to try the ham and cheese next I think.

Originally published in April 2019. We’ve lost this fine restaurant to the pandemic.

I’ve been dragging my feet on this one because the tacos are the bomb, but I hadn’t tried the brunch yet until this past weekend. Had some friends in town who also hadn’t tried the brunch so it worked out, even though we got there right in the middle of rush and had to stand around for an hour before we were seated. Worked out though–we had plenty of catching up to do, but that is the only downside to Rum House–it can be very crowded sometimes. Also, depending on where you are coming from, happy hour can be hard to get to because of Perkins Road traffic and you fight for parking since Olive or Twist shares the same parking lots. Worth it though. Great atmosphere. The whole place turns open air when the weather is nice. One of the nicer and funkier patios in BR. And exotic tacos filled with curried lamb, duck cracklings, fried oysters, blackened mahi–I’m sure you’re getting the picture (pictures).

The brunch buffet is in a room of its own off the patio and is extensive. The main strength is the number of condiments to dress your own breakfast nachos or add to the breakfast tacos, or dress out your buttermilk biscuits or blueberry pancakes. There’s a variety of scrambled egg dishes and breakfast meats and of course, fruit and yogurt.

Rum House is definitely worth any traffic or parking hassles you encounter, and worth the wait if it’s busy. Set aside some time, some island time, especially at brunch because once you’re there, you won’t be in a hurry to leave.

I feel like Bumsteers has borrowed a lot from my favorite place in the panhandle, The Gulf on Perdido Beach Blvd in Orange Beach, AL. The burger/taco menu, the shipping container/open air chic decor and layout, the 1/2 and 1/8 sheet pans for service, and the very crafty drafts on tap. Good move.

Unfortunately though, they could not borrow the beach. Perkins Road ≠ Perdido Key. Other than that, the burgers and tacos are special. They have the style and vision to be great, and the kitchen has executed everything I’ve gotten so far to perfection. Seriously, I would go back just to have more of the Mexican street corn alone. The char-grilled beef patties have that outdoor zing to them that reminds me of Port-of-Call in NO. And the smoked brisket in the tacos was tender with just the right amount of smoke. The Cabo Shrimp Tacos are light and refreshing and perfect for sitting in the sun with a nice craft pint to go with. All the sauces were spot on, the garni fresh and I actually had to tear myself away from the Mexican risotto and charro beans to finish my brisket tacos while they were still hot. There are still a lot of things I want to try, The brisket sliders, The Ozark and Bandito burgers–and I’m really looking forward to a lunch combo of the smoked jerk wings with a side of marinated cucumbers and tomatoes. I just love going to a place that gets me thinking in advance of what I want over the next five trips.

Now they do have some indoor seating to go with the upstairs open air and the downstairs covered patio because it is BR and you can never count on the weather. They also have wine on tap, and Bartles and James spiked tonic water (this generation’s wine cooler!) and all the necessary liquors for your favorite outdoor cocktails if that’s the mood you’re in once you hit the patio. They are still working on the place, with misting fans still to come, and probably an awning for the rooftop bar area, but what they have right now will work just fine while they prepare for summer’s onslaught. Good move, Bumsteers, very good move.

What better place to start out on Hot Art, Cool Nights? News flash: talked briefly with Chase Lyons and he told me Soji would be entering the catering realm very soon. Good news for anyone who wants to just walk away from the same old, same old. I am not going to criticize Southern Belle Sandwiches for their crustless little ham and turkey and pimento marvels, but surprises are nice, especially in the food and beverage arena. I can report that Soji has expanded the offerings at their raw bar yet again, and the timing with the onset of summer is impeccable. I also tried Orion beer for the first time and I have to say, I think it is better than both Kirin and Sapporo. Same kind of light lager, but the flavor is a bit deeper and fuller than those two. Perfect compliment for the blend of sashimi and rolls I had in mind for the evening.

After dinner it was time to catch the rest of the show. Jade Brady, who also works at Soji, had a number of her pieces on hand, but some of the other artists she’d lined up didn’t make it for fear of the weather. Luckily, that held off. Jade has another solo show coming up at Circa 1857 on June 6th. More gossip: Kelli Paxton, GM of Radio Bar and co-owner of the beer garden she and Dave Remmetter and one other owner are opening at Steele and Government told me it her was her last shift at Radio Bar and she was headed over to the new place to help lead the final push for opening. We chatted about the exhilarating nightmare of opening new places for a bit. I’ve opened several myself and can assure you it is exciting and terrifying and exhausting all at once. I told her the story of the original Mike Anderson’s on Highland opening without any bread knives to cut poboys with. That’s why I usually give the new spots a week or five to work out the kinks. I also stopped by Red Stick Social at the Electric Depot since I had a free shuttle run over there and didn’t have to work out where to park or where the entrance was. I think the place has an outside chance at success, mainly as a private party venue. The bowling lanes are the only thing that really stands out. And I managed to score a new piece at Pop Shop Records where Brandi Catoire had her display set up. I grabbed this one because I thought it would work well with the Willie Lamendola and Gabriel Saint pieces I already had if I moved one photo to another spot.

All in all a very productive evening. Looking forward to the next Mid City Makers Market and the upcoming First Wednesday at The Baton Rouge Gallery. There’s a lot more culture in BR than is readily apparent. You just have to go out and track it down. Facebook has made it much easier to keep up with events. All you have to do is like one event and their algorithm will run every other similar event by you. You can mark yourself interested, like and follow, and get notifications in advance and the day of. Pretty neat, and other than keeping up with old friends in different places, probably the most appealing feature of Zuckerberg’s Village.

The Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola was fascinating, but inside and in Hangar One the displays were a bit spit and polish after spending the previous day on the clean but worn USS Alabama. I guess it was inevitable that the visits to Stennis and the Mighty A would linger and maybe even overwhelm a bit, but the top flight birds seemed so sparkly in comparison, and I found myself leaving the phone in the pocket. I did try to take pictures of the many models of aircraft carriers which were quite special, but they were hard to get a good photo of in their glass displays. Ditto for the trolley tour of the flight line outside (restricted area, don’t get off the boat!) which is a shame because those craft were all a bit worse for wear. Our guide flew a patrol bomber, so he was heavily biased towards those pilots who flew the slower, much more vulnerable craft, and I can’t really blame him for that–but he did blow right by the Phantom saying, Yes, there were alot of those made, and all the allies bought some. Really? That’s it? Kind of rankled an F4 fan like me, but the most problematic thing about the tour was not being able to get any decent photos of the fighters, recon planes, and patrol bombers they had out on the line. He did make the sobering point of how we lost six hundred aircraft just ferrying goods over the Himalayas to keep China in the fight against the Japanese. The US built over 400,000 warplanes in the six years of WWII and, while they weren’t just thrown together, there were no frills. Not even conduit to protect the wiring, since none of the planes were expected to last very long at all.

The museum did have several displays of life back home in the war bond era, along with mockups of WWI and Vietnam scratch air camps, but I was totally fascinated by this mock up of a home kitchen, mainly because my mom had a yellow ceramic bowl just like the one pictured that she use to fill to the brim with her magnificent potato salad to go with her skillet fried chicken. Most often she combined cans of Niblets corn and Petis Pois peas with lots and lots of butter to round out the meal. And whatever potato salad was left over (there was never any leftover fried chicken!) was used for ham and potato salad sandwiches. My best potato salad never came close to hers, which is why I’ve started cheating and using red B potatoes and adding a hint of mustard, things she would never have done. But hopefully we all remember a kitchen similar to this, and similar memories, and I am so sorry for those who don’t share those memories of a central kitchen that was clean and productive and important to the whole family.

After leaving the Pensacola Naval Air Station, I circled back to Orange Beach and checked in at the Perdido Beach Resort. I had to wait a minute poolside (about half a bushwacker) until my room was ready, but then I was able to get it together and take the short walk over to The Gulf. These are my two favorite places in the panhandle so far. The PBR has a two chair balcony for each room, and if you get the pool view, you get to look down on that well laid out poolside area with a splendid view of the beach as well. It is also right next to the marina channel leading boats of all sizes and varieties out into the deep water. They’ve got a great little poolside bar that’s shaded but still open air, and a short order window for poolside pizzas and burgers. Also a high end restaurant and a quality breakfast buffet.

If you’re driving straight in, The Gulf is the perfect place to check in and lose what stress you have left before you dive into the rest of the trip. Constructed entirely of shipping containers the bar and gift shop and lounge area are all entirely open air, and that constant fresh breeze might be the single greatest attraction in the panhandle. There’s always a couple of gourmet tacos on hand and I always go that direction, even though I did have the burger once and it was also outstanding. Very hard to go wrong here. Now this is my favorite spot, but there are plenty of options. The Flora-Bama Yacht Club is an open air waterfront restaurant on Ole River just down the road from the PBR and across the street from the world famous Flora-Bama Lounge & Package Store and a great place to watch some football and/or listen to some pretty good beach bands. The Sunset Grille is a great stop in as well, but the thing to do is just get down here and get down.

I also highly recommend The Voyager restaurant inside the Perdido Beach Resort. I’ve had a number of good meals here looking out over the waves. This time I went light with a chilled seafood platter, but I was really impressed with the Caesar salad on on earlier trip because the dressing was obviously made to order and they garnished the salad with crisp fried anchovies. Haven’t seen that before. That night they also had an intriguing rack of lamb special that I almost went for even though I know I can’t really handle meat past lunchtime any more. Bummer, but the only one really if I don’t count the hundreds of wasted photo ops on the flight line and later or the beach.

The next morning was perhaps the best part of the trip for me. It was about 63 degrees on the beach in the pre-dawn as I followed the hungry terns and one very dignified heron down the beach to the rock jetty bordering the deep water channel under the bridge. I had a coffee in one hand and the phone in the other. The birds wouldn’t let me get close enough for a good shot–I enjoyed them very much anyway. I really wish I could find a way to start every day barefoot on the edge of the ocean. Maybe some day that dream will come true. Nothing wrong with wishing on a star, or on a beach.

There was the threat of severe weather all day, in fact, the air show in Biloxi was cancelled for that day, and right after I got into my room after touring the USS Alabama, the tornado siren went off. I was strangely unaffected, and maybe that was due to spending so much time in and around and on the deck of the battleship. I knew, intellectually, that it was like a little town on the water, but actually ducking through hatches and climbing up and down ladders and checking out the museum style recreations of shipboard life brought it all to life like a weird, half remembered dream of being there yourself. Of course that is unimaginable, I mean, even if you were stuck in traffic in the middle of summer in Baton Rouge and turned the ac off in the car and left the windows rolled up until you just felt like shit and couldn’t take it any more–it wouldn’t be close to what those men went through every day without the opportunity to bail or call it off or do something else. Even those that volunteered were giving up control of their lives. Even those who made it through gave up some of their most important years and were never the same. And those who didn’t go to war were shamed at home, if not openly, then subtly, back when being a man’s man was way more important to everyone than it is now. The USS Alabama is a crypt, a monument, and an inspiration. We don’t know, we can’t imagine what those men went through unless we were there beside them. They accomplished incredible things. They accomplished terrible things. So it goes, as Vonnegut would tell us.

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There was also an air park and a tank farm on site, and unfortunately the day I was there was also the date of an auto show with hundreds of chopped vehicles and those who love them on hand. My room at the Quality Inn in Historic Downtown Mobile was not ready for me when I was ready for it, so I wandered a bit and discovered yet another southern pirate city that had more in common with those other cities like New Orleans, and Galveston and Savannah than any of them had with other cities in their state. I found a tourista style joint for lunch and tried my first Monte Cristo sandwich, which was edible but not very exciting, then lingered in a super comfortable coffee bar called Serda before going back to the hotel and quizzing the check in clerk on her favorite sushi spot. That was a good move on my part, and one of the best travel tips I can give anyone. Disregard the online travel reviews and ask a service industry person where they think you should go. Wish I’d remembered to do that for lunch.

The sushi bar was named the Liquid Sushi Lounge, and the crew did a really nice job with both my meal and service. The shrimp spring rolls and shrimp tempura were both perfectly fried, and the sashimi was super fresh and I was impressed with the blossom arrangement. And in addition my server (who was reading a paperback of George R. R. Martin’s Book of Thrones, poor child!) pointed me to the Loda Biergarten where I found a nice Imperial red which is hard to find in Baton Rouge. Some beers just don’t make an appearance in Baton Rouge. You can find PBR and Natty Light, but hardly anyone carries High Life. There are more IPA’s than you can shake a stick at, but a red or brown ale? forget about it!

Here’s how they spent their evenings during the war in warrant officer country.

It’s all right there in the cartons of cigarettes in the ship’s store, the pinup girls all over the walls in every room that wasn’t an actual battle compartment, the rush to get to the mail from home. These men gave so very much of themselves so we could have what we have. I was fascinated by the galleys on board and the oh-so-familiar shapes of flattops and mixers and slicers and dish machines, but I think I’ll post a separate gallery of galleys on Facebook since only the real pros will find those shots as interesting as I did. I needed the USS Alabama, and I think, in a way, we all do. We need to remember how hard that generation fought for our votes to count, to mean something. A whole nation standing against tyrants who could care less what we thought, or loved, or longed for. I can only hope we don’t throw that hard fought freedom away, or forget those who fought for us to have it.

Can’t really call this a bucket list trip as much as a tying-up-loose-ends trip. On all the many trips I’ve taken from BR to the panhandle, from being a kid with the brothers and mom and pop, to the rare spring break excursion, and later, more recently, runs with friends to fish and golf and boat–I’ve always told myself I would stop and check out places like the Stennis Space Center, and the USS Alabama, and the National Naval Aviation Museum. That’s mainly what this trip was about, that and finding good eats along the way, and getting in some fun and sun and fish tacos and bushwackers. The usual checklist of things to do along with this important list (to me) of things to see.

The Infinity Science Center is the museum part of the Stennis Space Center with the requisite cafe and gift shop and theater and models and interactive exhibits, but they have an actual first stage booster from the Apollo Saturn Five rocket, the last one built that never went to space once the program was cancelled. Hard to describe feeling ten years old and ninety years old at the same time, but that’s what was going on as I saw these artifacts of the drive to reach the moon. That generation built so much. Interstate highways, countless bridges and overpasses, but the Saturn Five and the lunar landing vehicle and the Apollo command module still stand out as incredible accomplishments. And maybe I’ve been to too many funerals lately, but it also felt like I was celebrating and mourning a time we will never see again. Stennis itself is where the booster rockets were tested and it is strategically located between Michoud and Huntsville on the Pearl River. The boosters and rocket engines were barged to the facility for full blown testing. The tour was intense, and I’m glad I finally got around to it. Scored a pretty good mushroom swiss burger at the cafe, and some surprisingly good onion rings. Both were right up there with the best ballpark fare. After the meal, I headed on to Biloxi beach just in time to catch the Blue Angels practicing for the air show scheduled for the next day.

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The roar of the jets was exhilarating, as always. The tackiness of the beach decor (where did the pink and baby blue color scheme come from I wonder?) was reassuring, as always. And I found something you just don’t ever see in Baton Rouge on the menu at The Reef–a whole fried flounder. Not bad, not bad at all. I stayed at the Star Inn on the beach because it reminded me of the Bal-Moral Motor Court we stayed at when we were kids with the under the front window ac and percale bed covers. I’d give it two stars max. If you’re not being nostalgic or cheap, you can do much better in Biloxi.

All in all a great first day of the walkabout. I got in a nice stroll on the super white sand/brown water beach and could not stop thinking of all those people working together to send men to the moon. There was a show in the theater concentrating on NASA’s mission to Mars, and it was interesting to reflect on the past and harbor some hope for the future, as Pollyanna as that might seem.

I have to say it was incredibly difficult to stick to the plan of trying Rocco’s meatball poboy when I found myself inside looking at all the possibilities.

I was at the counter looking at the board and the cashier asked me how I was feeling today. I had to be truthful and tell her I was torn between four different options. The meatball, the philly cheesesteak, the bbq beef, and the roast beef with gravy. They do offer a half and half fried seafood poboy, but that’s only the large and I would need help these days to down one of those. Just thinking about the bbq beef brought back memories of Hopper’s and Joe D’s and I’m pretty sure I’m going right back to Rocco’s to give that one a try, but this trip I stuck to the plan to research as many meatball poboys as I can and I’m very glad I did. This one had a really bright sauce to go with the really deep beef and pork flavors of the meatballs. It was also very attractive on the plate.

It was just as messy to eat as a roast beef with gravy, and I suspect the bbq beef will require more than one napkin as well. This is a pretty straightforward poboy shop decor-wise. LSU and Saints memorabilia and Baton Rouge and New Orleans photos and posters. I got there well before noon and the place was already three quarters full and it seemed like a lot of folks were lunchtime regulars and knew each other and the staff as well, but there wasn’t an excess of small talk or storytelling because everyone was serious about chowing down on some seriously good poboys. Here’s a decor shot. I’ll share more when I go back to try the bbq beef, and I’ll probably spring for some house made onion rings next time as well.

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Okay so they had a half poboy and cup of soup special when I went back the next day for the bbq beef that I just couldn’t get off my mind. So glad I did. The gumbo was really nice, but the bbq beef did bring back so many memories. One that I’d almost forgotten was that there was a Rocco’s on Lake Street underneath the washateria that fronted on Chimes Street. There was an internal stair connecting the laundry upstairs with the poboy shop below. That was a very long time ago, but the bbq beef is just as good now as it was way back when.