Month: August 2019

Pork ribs. Sweet, spicy. Tender, crisp. Garnished with pickled cabbage, carrots, and mung bean sprouts. Nice bone handles for easy consumption.

I have had some really special meals here. The inside isn’t much to look at, but the staff has always been friendly and they definitely know how to cook.

This time I went with the won ton soup and the shrimp fried rice. The soup didn’t quite measure up to the incredible one I found in Huntsville a while back, but it’s the best I’ve tried so far in BR. And the jumbo shrimp and the mung beans seperate this fried rice from everyone else’s. You can find all the standard offerings here at Nine Dragon, but there are also some really off the wall dishes like the Shredded Pig Stomach Salad that you can go for if you are up for it. So far I’ve not been any braver than the Octopus Balls which were quite delicious, but I hope to have the courage to take a bigger leap next time I’m there. This time was all about the ongoing search for a magnificent won ton soup. I will keep looking.

Muffaletta and boudin for lunch from Cannatella’s on Government. The deli guy asked me if I wanted my muff pressed or traditional (room temp) and I went with pressed, but next time I think I’ll wait until I get back to the house and use my panini press instead. Wanted to check out their boudin because I’m planning on doing some boudin and pepperjack taco’s this weekend and I needed to see if theirs measured up. It does, and I’m pretty excited to see how the combo of this boudin, pepperjack cheese, corn tortillas, pico de gallo, and extra cilantro works out. I’ve got a chipotle aioli at the house I can throw on as well. This muff really made me miss the Library on Chimes Street which had the best muffaletta I’ve ever had anywhere. And this visit also made me think how rare it is in BR to find someone selling links of hot boudin, You’d think it would be more readily available, but Jerry Lee’s is the only other place I can think of where you can walk in and walk right back out with hot boudin.

Update: The boudin and pico combo was good. Makes sense. Boudin is pork and rice, not strange taco additions at all. Of course I had leftover tortillas and pico so that led to blackened catfish tacos the next day.

This sandwich was everything I’d hoped it would be when I saw it advertised on Facebook as Jed’s August poboy of the month. Super fresh bread and incredibly sweet peppers to set off the shaved ribeye and provolone. Really good take on a classic and one I highly recommend.

El Tio is a state of the art taqueria located on Burbank out past Gardere. Comically stereotypical sign and window posters, immaculate dining space with big screen televisions tuned to Telemundo, and, most importantly, real deal street tacos with corn tortillas , onions, and cilantro paired with excellent asada, lengua, and camerones.

If you follow me at all, you know that tender, juicy lengua is my benchmark for taquerias. El Tio delivers and joins the ranks of Antojitos Franko’s and La Tienda as the best places to head for real Mexican tacos in BR. Rum House and Gov’t Taco have great tacos, and I still love Taco Bell, but these tacos remind me of all the good times I had down in Ensenada many, many years ago. I’d never heard of El Tio before running across a Geaux Rouge post directing me that way. Thanks Geaux Rouge. And I saw a couple of other intriguing joints out there I haven’t heard of that I need to check out soon. Oh the joys of exploration and discovery.

They didn’t skimp when they set up Rouj Creole. Lots of nice lavish touches that would be wasted if they couldn’t cook. They can cook. My main reason for checking the place out was a menued paella, rare in BR. I hope to do my own version for the first home game at my favorite tailgate, but more on the lines of a ham and shrimp Spanish jambalaya. The sliding scale between paella and jambalaya is broad. I suspect the divergence began many, many years ago because saffron is expensive and doesn’t grow well in Louisiana (otherwise we would definitely see it in our farmers market) and while saffron still isn’t cheap, it’s a lot more accessible now than it was then. Rouj Creole has dedicated their menu to “walking back” some dishes in our cuisine to be closer to their origins, but that definitely takes some imagination and a very loose sense of authenticity. For example, the Pescado + Paella I got would have represented a remarkable feat of fishing and gathering in Spanish Louisiana. How you would put together a dish with mahi and mussels, shrimp, crab, crawfish and chorizo without refrigeration is beyond me.

Now they aren’t giving this dish away, but there’s a reason for that. There is a whole lot of seafood in this dish. It is packed with shrimp and crawfish tails and I really couldn’t believe just how much backfin crabmeat was included. It was very good, and luckily for your budget concerns, very easy to share with one other if you spring for one of the many appetizers as well. Normally I wouldn’t have jumped to the World Fare portion of their menu without giving one of the basics like their crawfish étouffée a try first, but I definitely wanted to research a live paella to get ideas for my Spanish jambalaya project. With any luck, Solera will open soon and I’ll be able to check theirs out as well. I really liked this version, and it was done well enough that I will certainly be back to try some of their other reconstructed Louisiana fare. Now researching paella was only part of my plan for that day, and luckily when the barkeep asked what was up and I shared that I was on my way to see Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (no spoilers) we dove deep into Tarentino and the Cohen brothers along with Marvel, DC, the new Star Trek movies (which she hadn’t seen and I encouraged her to check out) and her dissertation on her perceived shortcomings of the current Star Wars cycle (she thought it mirrored the original arc too closely and wondered why they couldn’t bring themselves to kill off an already dead Leia) all in the short time it took my food to arrive. Very enjoyable. And it is way too early to say anything at all about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood without spewing spoilers so all I can say about the film is that it is very, very Tarentino and that the cinematography doesn’t demand a big screen, but you might want to get out of the house and check it out before others do spoil it for you. There’s only so far lalalalalalala will go for this one.

Rouj Creole has an abundance of nice small touches of decor that make it a very comfortable and uplifting bar and dining room. Mostly that is achieved by the myriad of different light fixtures, but also the french striped linens, some of the table and bar ware, and the Steely Dan playing over the sound system when I sat down to peruse the menu. Nice place, nice staff, and, most importantly, they can cook.

Here’s something you don’t see every day, a boudin and pepperjack hand pie with pepper jelly dressed out with an excellent biscuit, real grits, and two eggs. Elsie’s does not paint between the lines. They are always more than willing to take any dish in a new direction. Very refreshing.

When you learn to trust a bar or restaurant, one of the greatest advantages is being able to try new things with confidence. It’s easy to experiment at Soji, because the staff never lets you down. I’ve yet to be disappointed, never had to send anything back or even wait overly long for something I’ve ordered. The katsudon was not an exception to this rule. The pork was perfectly panko fried and the rice was wonderful, with all sorts of flavorful bits and pieces. I really enjoy hitting Soji early in the lunch hour and sitting at the raw bar to yak with the guys prepping there. Like any other restaurant, there’s a lot of artists and writers and musicians on staff at Soji. When I lived and worked in Santa Monica, one of the running jokes was when someone told you they were an actor, you immediately asked Really? What restaurant? and that really never changes. The service industry has launched millions of people into unrelated careers. It’s a good way to get through school, or help with the transition to an entry level day gig, and something to fall back on in between jobs if an attempt to better yourself doesn’t pan out. Sure, some employees will remain just that, with nowhere better to go than another restaurant, but the talent pool in restaurants and bars is deep with people pursuing their dreams. Makes for a great lunch. A new and exciting food to try, new people to talk to, all sitting right in the middle of a concept new to BR that pushes the boundaries. And don’t we all like to push boundaries.

Having survived a particularly nasty form of cancer myself, I try to support the cure whenever I can. When Umami has partnered with @franzborghardt to donate 100% of proceeds to the Susan G Komen Foundation, it’s a no brainer to go check out the special roll and support researching better treatments and results for breast cancer. The surgery for my esophageal cancer was brutal, but the follow up chemo and radiation did not have me puking and losing my hair. The fact that I survived at all was pure dumb luck (a colonoscopy that I had continually put off led to the discovery of a very aggressive form of cancer in an incredibly small window for survival) coupled with the efforts of doctors and researchers across the globe working to improve treatment and survivability of all forms of cancer. I was always tired during treatment, and I had to scramble to find dishes I still wanted to cook and eat. For example, the cheese omelets I had been eating for breakfast were too dry, so I had to resort to sunny side up fried eggs chopped up in a sort of instant grits or oatmeal soup to get by. I lived, when people with my disease always used to die, and my treatment wasn’t nearly as horrible as it could have been and would have been without the extensive research that is ongoing all over the world. The only bright side of ever having cancer is that you know what others face, and it makes you want to help.

Of course, being at Umami I couldn’t just eat the donation roll and go. Chef Cong had fresh sardine on the menu that I had to try. A bit sweeter and drier than mackerel, I liked it a lot and would pick it over mackerel. I still had a bit of room left so I finished with this beautiful sashimi sampler.