Restaurant Insider
- Restaurants
NFL.com
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As spring approaches, a young man’s thoughts turn to … turn to … well, it’s probably not a good sign that I can’t remember what a young man’s thoughts are supposed to turn to but at least I have a column for you – what more could you possibly want? I mean, from me, anyway.
China Rose, one of Lakeview’s most beloved Chinese restaurants, is now open at 3501 North Arnoult Road in Metairie. The restaurant serves all the dishes you’d expect to find at a Chinese restaurant but also has an “Authentic Chinese” menu with more exotic fare. The “authentic” menu includes a number of dishes cooked with Chinese pickled mustard greens, tons of noodle dishes and a slow-cooked pork belly dish served with a sweetish sauce and baby bok choy that’s just outstanding (Dong-Po Pork). The appetizer/dim sum menu isn’t as extensive as what you’ll find at Royal China (600 Veterans Blvd.), but then again, to my knowledge no other local restaurant can top Royal China’s dim sum selection. I haven’t yet worked my way through the menu at China Rose by any means but based on what I’ve eaten there so far, it’s a definite goal.
Technically it’s not a New Orleans restaurant, but I recently had a chance to sample the appetizer menu at Galatoire’s Bistro in Baton Rouge (17451 Perkins Road), and everything I had was excellent. I get nervous when a place I love changes, or looks like it’s about to change, but in this instance, new equals good. Most of what I consider the hits at Galatoire’s (209 Bourbon St.), are on the menu at the bistro; you can stick to Soufflé potatoes, Fried Eggplant, Oysters en Brochette and Shrimp Remoulade for example. But you can also order escargot in puff pastry with herbsaint cream, a killer duck crêpe with homemade boursin cheese, a port-cherry garnished with pistachios, and a really nice version of barbecue shrimp with crabmeat that’s served over a thick slice of fried eggplant. I think taking the menu in a different direction is a much better idea than trying to recreate an ersatz Galatoire’s away from its natural habitat on Bourbon Street.
It is cliché among food writers these days to note that in post-Katrina New Orleans the options for Latino food have never been better. But operating on the principle that there’s safety in numbers, let me add my voice to the rest of the gang and point you in the direction of Taqueria Guerrero Mexico (208 N. Carrollton Ave.), a nifty little restaurant just down the street from Venezia and Angelo Brocato’s. The menu at Guerrero is fairly extensive but you may not make it past the antojitos (“appetizers”) because that’s where you’ll find outstanding tacos, tortes (“sandwiches”) Gorditas and Quesadillas which you can fill with things like chorizo, beef tongue, barbacoa (“barbecue” or grilled pork) or chicken. The restaurant is open 7 days a week, 10 a.m.-9 p.m., though their late opening is a little odd considering they also serve a bunch of egg dishes on the breakfast portion of the menu. I haven’t encountered barriers of any kind, language or otherwise, so add them to your list!
Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Email Robert Peyton: rdpeyton@gmail.com.
Table Talk
- Restaurants
Jason Berry
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At first glance, the leafy, tree-lined stretch of Dryades Street between Soniat Street and Napoleon Avenue appears mostly residential. But scattered around this neighborhood are several good dining destinations. Anchored by Gautreau’s at one end and Pascal’s Manale at the other, the area has recently seen the addition of the casual Italian café Il Posto. And with the butter-drenched promise of Charlie’s Steakhouse on the horizon, this nice little collection of establishments offers a wide range of dining options.
Tucked away on Soniat Street, discretion seems to be a guiding principle of Gautreau’s. Since reopening a year ago with emerging talent Sue Zemanick behind the stove and charismatic proprietor Patrick Singley again presiding over the clubby dining room, it has found its stride as it hums along with its quintessential, understated elegance.
Chef Zemanick’s menu focuses on classic French preparations and features uncommon dishes such as her Provencal-inspired appetizer of Sautéed Brandade Cake with basil aioli. Another appetizer of twin Sea Scallops arrived seared to a caramelized crispness, the meat inside cooked to opaque perfection. Both were laid atop a bed of fresh fettuccine tossed with marinated tomatoes and smoky bits of diced bacon. Dollops of fresh pesto added to the palette of flavors.
Crispy Sweetbreads came pan-fried and garnished with Louisiana crabmeat in a lemon beurre blanc and potatoes prepared in the classic Brabant style. I’ve had sweetbread dishes prepared elsewhere that obscure rather than elevate the offal – but not here. The beurre blanc provided richness without obscuring their delicacy.
For entrées, don’t overlook the Roasted Chicken, often a bellwether dish on any serious French menu. A simply composed dish well executed here, it featured two chicken breasts cut in the airline style, a manner which preserves a small amount of bone that allows the meat to be juicier and more flavorful when cooked. The skin was crisp and tasty, and the bird was rested atop a nest of garlic mashed potatoes floating in a sea of jus, flanked by harcourt verts. Another entrée of Sautéed Grouper was notable for its silky, lobster-infused Américaine sauce. The lobster quotient was ratcheted up a notch with accompanying chunks of the crustacean. A scattering of house-made gnocchi contributed some starch.
Desserts seem a more straightforward affair than the savory side of the menu, featuring classic staples such as Vanilla Bean Crème Brûlée and Flourless Chocolate Cake. Next time I go I’ll likely try the retro-inspired Caramelized Banana Split with walnuts, butterscotch and fudge sauce. To augment their desserts, Gautreau’s features a well-selected assemblage of after dinner wines, single malt scotches and other cordials.
But Gautreau’s only serves dinner and is more of a special occasion destination. One thing that this neighborhood lacked was a casual place for lunch. This niche has now been filled by Il Posto, an Italian-inspired café that offers up a warm and friendly locale for light breakfasts and lunch.
Il Posto is owned and operated by first-time small business owner Madison Curry. Prior to opening Il Posto, Curry worked at The St. James Cheese Company. Connections made there come into play at Il Posto, such as the selection of cheese and the soups, composed by Chef Corbin Evans. Additionally, the H&H bagels are imported from New York along with the coffee, which Madison buys from a former employer in Manhattan. “I get my coffee from my old bosses in New York,” she says. “They take their coffee very seriously.”
In a city inundated with mega-caloric poor boys, here you’ll find a lighter palette of sandwich offerings, which are no less tasty. The menu offers up a carefully-composed selection of soups, salads and pressed sandwiches assembled with top-shelf ingredients. The Classic Prosciutto is made with Prosciutto San Danielle and fresh mozzarella on pressed Ciabatta. A smear of basil pesto gives it a little complexity.
On a cold day, the soup and sandwich combo hits the spot. The simple Grilled Cheese is made with a mild and tasty fontina. A Tuscan-style White Bean and Prosciutto Soup complemented the cheese. Other popular items include the Antipasti platter, a selection of roasted vegetables along with two meats and two cheeses, olives, fruits and nuts. “Our most popular salad right now is the Beet and Walnut Salad,” Curry says. Breakfast items include granola, fruit and yogurt, along with a pleasant place to relax and peruse the morning paper.
Just down the street, the venerable Pascal’s Manale, family owned and operated since 1913, manages to be two things in one: a lively oyster bar up front and a genteel dining destination popular with families and the older set in the back. Accommodating both is an elegant, carved wooden bar that specializes in classic co*cktails and other unpretentious libations.
The dish most associated with Manale’s is, of course, its misnomered BBQ Shrimp, which originated here and whose myriad iterations have since spread city-wide. A generous mound of plump, peel-and-eat gulf shrimp swimming in a bowl of molten butter and pepper – in tackling them I created a Jackson Pollock-style vectoring of grease splatters and shrimp whiskers upon the tablecloth. The bib helps some but, if you order this dish don’t be wearing anything nice. Prudence would dictate that this goes for your date as well. Napkins essentially play a triage role in that they clean your hands enough to make a break for the restroom sink. If you crave the shrimp but don’t want the mess, try their BBQ Shrimp Poor Boy for lunch, which comes in a self-contained, easy-to-tackle French bread form.
Other good dishes include the Pan Roast, a combination of oysters, shrimp, crab, parsley, garlic and butter, broiled to a toasty brown on top. My father has always been a fan of the meatballs and spaghetti made with ground veal. This is good comfort food. No fresh-grated parmesan here – it’ll be that granular stuff from the cardboard cylinder – but that’s part of the appeal.
The only thing missing is the classic sports memorabilia that used to hang in the dining room. I hear they stored it upstairs following the remediation; here’s hoping it finds its way back onto the walls. This is a place where people go to seek reassurance and I get the feeling that both customers and staff aren’t in the mood to try anything new or different. Approached with this understanding, Pascal’s Manale remains a neighborhood gem.
DIG IN!
Gautreau’s
1728 Soniat St.
899-7397
Il Posto Italian Café
4607 Dryades St.
895-2620
Pascal’s Manale
1838 Napoleon Ave. (Corner of Dryades Street)
895-4877
A bark in the park
Site Staff
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Man’s best friends may soon have their very own slice of the great outdoors in the heart of New Orleans. A new nonprofit, NOLA City Bark, is marshalling support for the city’s first official dog park to be established within City Park as a haven for dog owners to bring their pets for some off-leash fun and exercise.
The park is being planned for a 4.6-acre site behind Popp Fountain, near Interstate 610. With a $500,000 fund raising campaign now under way, City Bark directors hope construction will begin this spring.
Jackie Shreves, founder of NOLA City Bark and a board member of both City Park and the LA/SPCA, says dogs aren’t the only ones who could benefit from the new attraction.
“When you visit dog parks, immediately you notice the socialization factor going on between people and between dog owners,” she says. “They may come from all different backgrounds but this similar interest provides such an easy introduction.”
Shreves hopes the new dog park could also rejuvenate a section of City Park that’s now used only rarely, while giving residents another new quality-of-life amenity in their park.
“We started doing research on parks around the country and I could hardly find another city that didn’t have a dog park already. I realized we were really behind the times on this,” she says.
One silver lining is that City Bark can benefit from the best practices of other such facilities and learn from their experiences. As a result, the City Bark plan calls for annual permit fees paid by dog owners to allow entry. The permits, issued by veterinarians and the LA/SPCA, would simultaneously provide operating revenue for City Park to maintain the dog park and create a system for ensuring dogs using the park are up to date on vaccinations.
The site already has a shelter with restrooms and some planned dog park improvements include walking paths and benches, dog drinking fountains and wash stations and separate areas for large and small breeds. Shreves says fencing will be erected in a round pattern so that the perimeter contains no square angles where dogs can feel cornered and become defensive.
“Hopefully, people will be coming here some day to model future dog parks after ours,” says Shreves.
City Bark plans to present detailed plans for the dog park this month. To get involved, go to www.citybark.org.
PERSONA: Bob Breck
- Personalities
Photos by Zach Smith
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Neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow – though maybe a hurricane named Katrina – can keep Bob Breck from his appointed rounds of forecasting the weather to New Orleanians. In fact, Breck and anchor John Snell had to be taken off the air and from the WVUE studio on S. Jefferson Davis Parkway by sheriffs the night the hurricane hit. They set up shop again in the office of the late Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee, then the station broadcast from Mobile, Ala., for three months.
Breck started his career in Tampa, Fla. – he had been rejected by 33 stations (one reason was because he looked too young) before Roy Leep, the station’s general manager, took a chance on him. Breck’s next stop was Dayton, Ohio, then he and his family packed up and arrived in New Orleans in 1978.
The date of April 3, 2008, will mark the official 30th anniversary of Breck’s first on-air appearance as a meteorologist in New Orleans. Through the years – working for just one station, a feat not repeated by any other meteorologist in the city – Breck has been through six owners, many general managers and news directors and in the double digits with anchor teams. Breck says as a result he’s “the original ‘Survivor.’” He has had offers from other stations through the years but why “be a small fish in a big pond, when I can be a big fish in a small pond?” he asks.
What keeps him at it? Read on. Because as we all know, watching weather in New Orleans, next to Mardi Gras, is a time-honored tradition. And it’s one that keeps on challenging meteorologists such as Breck.
Age: 60 Job: Chief meteorologist for WVUE-TV, Fox 8 Family: Wife, Brenda Breck; Three sons from first wife, the late Paula Breck: Rob, Ryan and Justin.
Two dogs: Zack, a Scottie (Scottish terrier); and Zoe, a Westie (West Highland terrier) Resides: Metairie Grew up: Hammond, Ind. (18 miles from downtown Chicago)
Education: Bachelor of Science in meteorology and oceanography from University of Michigan
Favorite book: I am currently reading Cool It, about the doom and gloom predictions about global warming. The writer is saying for everyone to “cool it,” as in calm down. The other book I’m reading is Impact of Humans on Weather and Climate.
Favorite movie: I like Jack Nicholson. I enjoyed seeing him in Something’s Got to Give and The Bucket List.
Favorite TV show: I don’t get to watch TV that much.
Favorite restaurant: Commander’s Palace
Favorite food: Charbroiled oysters from Drago’s [His love for these oysters are so well known, that for his 60th birthday the WVUE staff got him a gift certificate just for that.] Hobbies: Fishing and golfing [Bob shoots in the 90s and 100s, though he doesn’t play enough for a handicap. But one day he shot a memorable round of 79 at Chateau Country Club.]
So I’m nosing around your very high-tech studio (the meteorologists have their own studio within the WVUE office) and came upon each day’s weather handwritten – in pencil – on a desk calendar. It seems very old school. I kept one for every year that I worked and I stored them in my office. Before Katrina, if you asked me what day the May flood was in 1995, I could’ve gone back to that year’s calendar and found it out – whether it was a Wednesday or Thursday, as well as see what else was going on with the weather that week. I lost everything from the past 30 years – even my original audition tape – when the WVUE offices flooded.
Why have you stayed at WVUE for so long? My viewers are what have kept me here. If I can quote anyone, it would be Sally Field when she accepted the Oscar for Norma Rae – “You like me. You really like me!”
When I came to New Orleans in 1978, TV weather was very different. When I started I brought in chromaimaging (the blue or green screen meteorologists stand in front of that allows for multiple images throughout the broadcast) and color. I was flamboyant, different … and little.
What has changed the most over the past 30 years? Forecasting the weather has become more accurate because we get better information from the computers – the programs have improved.
How did the station become branded as “Your Weather Authority”? A previous general manager said that because my research into weather was so strong, he wanted to brand the station around weather. Hence WVUE has been “Your Weather Authority” since the early 2000s.
When do you hear from viewers? When the weather is good, I don’t hear from them. When it’s bad I do – or even more so when they don’t get the message that there will be bad weather and then proceed like it will be good.
What’s your opinion about global warming? I believe we’re in a warming cycle, that it’s not because of too much carbon dioxide as Al Gore would like you to believe. There’s an equal amount of people who believe the Earth is in a warming cycle as a result of changing ocean currents in response to the energy coming from the sun.
Do you think New Orleanians learned a lesson about evacuating in time for a hurricane after what happened with Katrina? People base their decisions on perception. That’s my responsibility – to get the information from the National Hurricane Center, then tell viewers what’s going on so they can make an informed opinion. I’m sure there will be people who won’t evacuate but I can only do so much.
Weather here in south Louisiana is, to say the least, interesting. Is there any place in the U.S. that you think has “boring” weather? Every place is unique but I would have to admit that the weather in Arizona, Los Angeles and San Francisco would be boring, because it’s almost four to six months of the same weather every day.
Your wife Paula Breck passed away in 2002 due to a blood clot after surgery. This tragedy has led you on a mission: Raising awareness about DVT/PE. What is that and what are you doing? DVT is the type of clot; PE stands for pulmonary embolism. Paula broke her ankle and had to have surgery on it. While the surgery to repair her ankle went fine, the doctor missed the warning signs of a blood clot, even though her family had a history of blood clots.
Soon after she passed away, hospitals changed their standards of protocol for when a person goes into surgery to include finding out about history such as my Paula’s.
Since then I’ve given presentations about DVT/PE, and on March 5 at Touro Infirmary I’ll give another presentation, which is open to the public, about this. I think it’s a problem that has been under diagnosed – when people pass away, it’s blamed on something else, such as a heart attack, when there’s a good chance it could be DVT/PE. The only way you can find out is if you do an autopsy.
Will New Orleans Magazine be interviewing you for your 40th anniversary as a meteorologist at WVUE? No. I want to one day have the time to travel with my wife and do other things. I would like to go to Europe, Wine Country in California with Brenda (we’ve been there before but not together) and go back to Maui, where Brenda and I went on our honeymoon. Though I wouldn’t mind being a hurricane advisor after I retire.
True Confession: I watch a lot of golf on TV and all I ever dream of is to play in the PGA Tour. But knowing that I can never do that, I would like to get a hole-in-one.
You can see Bob Breck on the 5, 5:30 and 9 p.m. programs on WVUE-TV, Fox 8, and hear him on afternoon radio forecasts for 99.5FM.
Breck also has a blog: http://bobbreck.blogspot.com.
Julia Street
Site Staff
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Dear Julia and Poydras,
I visit your city frequently and am writing about the equestrian statues in New Orleans and what, if any, meaning the position of the horses’ feet have. For example, the statue of Andrew Jackson on his horse in Jackson Square has its horses two feet elevated. I have been told this means the rider went on to great things. Please tell me what you know about this. Poydras, this needs your expertise – get busy!
Dorothy Paulson
Coeur d’Alene, Idaho
Dorothy, Poydras never hangs out at any place where there are pigeons. He says that pigeons are lazy and that they all look alike.
Equestrian statues with both forefeet raised are generally interpreted as honoring people who died in battle, not who went on to great things, unless the great thing you’re talking about is the Great Beyond. Secondly, the whole equestrian statuary code, although widely disseminated and widely believed, is probably an urban myth. The Andrew Jackson monument in Jackson Square is among the approximately 30 percent of equestrian statues throughout the country for which hoof position is inconsistent with the rider’s manner of death. It seems the position of the horse’s feet may have more to do with the sculptor’s talent and sense of aesthetics than it does with any official code.
Dear Julia,
Why is the statue of Andrew Jackson in Jackson Square facing the Pontalba Building instead of facing the entrance to the square on Decatur Street? According to the books I’ve read on New Orleans, the Baroness Pontalba offered to pay for much of the cost of a statue honoring Jackson as long as it faced her apartment … but why?
Betty Lou Zimmerman
Metairie
I’m not sure which books you’re reading but I haven’t seen evidence that supports this charming story. Since the Baroness Pontalba owned both apartment buildings on what is now Jackson Square, did she also specify that half of this prime real estate was to overlook a horse’s behind? Madame Pontalba did contribute $1,500 towards the monument’s cost but the story about her having dictated the statue’s position may be strictly anecdotal. In the booklet Baroness Pontalba’s Buildings and the Remarkable Woman Who Built Them, Leonard Huber and architectural historian Samuel Wilson Jr. seem to refer to the popular story as they state “Whether or not the Baroness Pontalba permitted her enthusiastic admiration for Andrew Jackson to override her instinctive wariness in money matters cannot be documented but the likelihood is that at least self-interest prompted her to contribute to the beautification of the square on which her buildings faced.”
Dear Julia and Poydras,
My fiancé and I have recently bought a home in the Uptown area. I have found myself wondering about the history of our home, did anything exciting ever occur there and who originally built the home? With the great surplus of gorgeous historical homes in New Orleans, I’m sure many residents around the city may have wondered the history of their homes as well. Are there any databases or archives that give any facts on the homes of New Orleans?
Also, where does Uptown end and Carrollton begin? It seems this is up for debate depending on whom you are speaking to. Thanks Julia and Poydras.
Rochelle Busby
New Orleans
We do have an astounding inventory of historic homes but that supply is both finite and critically endangered. Like our wetlands, our local architecture is disappearing at a staggering rate. It isn’t simply the building material that’s being lost, it’s the craftsmanship the local architects, builders and woodworkers put into these homes and their architectural details. As the city confronts post-Katrina recovery and redevelopment, we’re poised to lose hundreds – maybe even thousands – of historic homes and the sad fact is that few people are likely to notice because so many of those houses are located in older or less-affluent neighborhoods, some of which are targeted for massive redevelopment.
I am unaware of any place that can provide ready-made histories of most old local houses. The only exceptions that come to mind would be for French Quarter residences, which are included in the 1966 Vieux Carré Survey, or for those houses whose neighborhoods are covered in the Friends of the Cabildo’s ongoing New Orleans Architecture series of books. In order to uncover detailed information about the vast majority of New Orleans’ older homes, most likely you’ll need to consult several different original resources in archives and municipal offices throughout the city. One way to become familiar with the available resources is to consult How to Research the History of Your House (or Other Building) in New Orleans, a booklet former city archivist Wayne Everard compiled for the New Orleans Public Library. The entire text of the 1986 publication is available online through the following link at the New Orleans Public Library’s Web site www.nutrias.org/~nopl/guides/house/title.htm
As for your other question, Lowerline Street is the historic boundary where Carrollton begins.
Dear Julia & Poydras,
My granddaughter and I are having a disagreement. She thinks I’m teasing her. I told her there was a nightclub I went to in the 1950s. The name of it was the Gay Paree. I don’t recall if it was in Marrero or Westwego. We took the Jackson Ferry to get there. Our friend Delores Gaudet sang there sometimes. A movie is riding on the answer. Zack, our parrot which we’ve had for 22 years, said to tell Poydras “Hello” and that we hope he had a happy Mardi Gras.
Millie Wires
Westwego
Does your granddaughter disbelieve your memory or that you went to bars? Whatever the case, she owes her grandmother a movie. A suburban city directory for 1959, includes a listing for the Gay Paree, a bar located at 5324 4th St., in Marrero. A similar directory from 1957, shows 5324 4th St., as being occupied by the Cocoanut Lounge, a watering hole run by Joseph S. Bruno. The Gay Paree, therefore, probably began operation some time around 1958. Before running the Gay Paree, its proprietor, Claudine Price, had been employed as a barmaid at the Fisherman’s Inn.
The 1961, suburban city directory indicates that part of Marrero was renumbered. The Gay Paree’s new address was 6117 4th St. By the time the next year’s suburban city directory was published, 6117 4th St., had been vacated.
Poydras says hello to Zack. Please understand that Poydras sometimes gets confused but he says he thinks he remembers Zack from when the two served together in the French Foreign Legion in Algeria; either that or he once saw Zack in Algiers. He’s not sure of which.
Dear Julia,
When visiting the Riverwalk recently with my granddaughter, we noticed the statue of Winston Churchill in the circle before the Hilton Riverfront Hotel that’s in front of the entrance before the tracks going to the Riverwalk. Would you please tell us why there is a statue commemorating Winston Churchill in the city of New Orleans?
Karla W. Comardelle
Paradis, La.
In November 1977, International Rivercenter, the company that built the Hilton on Poydras Street, donated to the city both British Place and the statue of Winston Churchill. The company’s generosity and choice of statuary makes sense once you know that the company’s co-managing partner, James S. Coleman Jr., served as honorary British Consul for Louisiana. The Churchill statue is the work of the Welsh sculptor Ivor Roberts-Jones.
Churchill’s daughter, Lady Soames, attended the dedication ceremony. Lady Soames told the audience of her late father’s pride that he had been granted honorary U.S. citizenship and that his mother was an American. Lady Soames went on to say she was honored her father was chosen to personify the 200 year bond between the U.S. and Great Britain as well as both nations’ “mutual love of freedom.”
The statesman himself also got in a few words, thanks to an old tape recording. As the crowd stood gathered at the foot of Poydras street, Winston Churchill was heard to proclaim that the U.S.’ support of Great Britain was “… like the Mississippi. It just keeps rolling along.”
Marquee
- Things To Do
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A Tribute to Tennessee
Legendary playwright Tennessee Williams had a soft spot for New Orleans, and it shows: our city serves as the setting in several of his most famous works. Now New Orleans honors his legacy every year at the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival. In its 22nd year, the five-day fête (March 26-30) will feature panel discussions, master classes, theater events, celebrity interviews, walking tours and more, all in the name of literature and New Orleans – a wonderful and inspiring combination. Some highlights this year will include a Los Angeles production Bent to the Flame – A Night with Tennessee Williams, which is a provocative performance that gives onlookers a realistic glimpse into Williams’ life. Some of the featured class subjects will include the memoir as literary nonfiction, what attracts the editor’s eye, finding an agent and the art of song writing. Most events will take place in the French Quarter and the festival will culminate in an entertaining “Stella and Stanley” shouting contest in Jackson Square. Information, 581-1144, www.tennesseewilliams.net
Parties for Patty
Perhaps you thought parade season was over; you were wrong. What better way to recognize St. Patrick than with a parade and a party? The St. Patrick’s Day parade, which follows a Mass at St. Mary’s Church, will wind down Magazine Street on Saturday, March 15, so check out the fun floats, flying vegetables and men in tuxes with green cumberbunds. Make sure to wear green yourself or you’ll get pinched! Then on Monday, March 17, the typical day on which St. Patrick’s Day occurs, Parasol’s Bar & Restaurant will host its annual St. Patrick’s Day block party in the Irish Channel, where the green beer and Guinness will be flowing freely starting in the morning. It’s an all day affair, so make sure to take the day off work.
Information, 897-5413, www.irishchannelno.org, www.parasols.com.
Rigoletto’s Rage
If your dad was a vicious hunchbacked jester who locked you away from the outside world, you’d want to escape, too. When a handsome duke encounters the daughter of the villain Rigoletto, he naturally wins her heart but of course, Daddy is outraged and wants to kill the duke in shining armor. Filled with deception, passion, love and revenge, this production of Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto will be performed at McAlister Auditorium March 14-16 with director Henry Akina and conductor Robert Lyall.
Information, 529-3000, www.neworleansopera.org.
Trailer Time
The Jefferson Performing Arts Society celebrates our funny bones with a production of The Great American Trailer Park Musical, a hilariously endearing story about the lives of an agoraphobic, a stripper, a man eager to win back his ex and a habitually pregnant woman. Taking place in Starke, Fla., the show may not be as appropriate for children as other JPAS productions but it’s sure to please an adult with a good – and raunchy – sense of humor. Directed by Sean Patterson, the show stars Meredith Long, Moria Gorrondona, Carrie Black and many talented others who will be putting on quite the trashy, vulgar and laugh-out-loud performance.
Information, 885-2000, www.jpas.org.
Have a Ball
On March 15, the Harlem Globetrotters will show off their skills at the New Orleans Arena. An entertaining and wholesome family event, the Globetrotters – sporting red, white and blue – are an exhibition basketball team that combines athletic ability with a sense of humor. They have played over 20,000 games since 1926, entertaining and inspiring generations. Look out for their mascot, “Globie” and listen for the song “Sweet Georgia Brown” – it’s the team’s signature.
Information, 587-3663, www.harlemglobetrotters.com.
Bringing the Party Home
After Hurricane Katrina, the Contemporary Arts Center moved its annual fundraiser, SweetArts, to New York City but now we can welcome it back home. On March 8, the CAC will be letting the good times roll. co*cktails, cuisine, games and music will be present and partygoers can enjoy the ultimate “arts and sass playground” of interactive fun, including performing in front of cameras with the help of the Rock Band Xbox game. Raffles will be held, Anais St. John will perform at the honorees’ reception and Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews and Orleans Avenue will play at the main event. Themed “Paper Scissors Rockstar,” the party will honor six outstanding foundations that have been an integral part of the CAC’s recovery.
Information, 528-3805, www.cacno.org.
Outdoor Living
- Lagniappe
Site Staff
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Straight Shooter
Photos by Marianna Massey
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Affectionately and casually known as shotguns, these long, narrow dwellings are the jewels of the New Orleans housing landscape.
The layout of a shotgun house is simple: Rooms are placed one behind the other in a straight line. As the legend goes, the name comes from the thinking that one could shoot a gun while standing in the front door and the bullet would travel uninterrupted through each room of the house and exit through the back door.
The definition of “shotgun” –– a style prevalent throughout the American South –– has evolved to include homes without hallways as well as those that are more than one room in width.
Historians believe the shotgun comes from West Africa via Haiti. It’s believed that the term “to-gun,” which means “place of assembly,” was probably used in
New Orleans by the influx of Afro-Haitian slaves in the 1800s and was misheard
as “shotgun.”
Shotguns come in three main variations: a single shotgun; a double shotgun; and a camelback, which can be a single or a double.
The shotgun single has one door and window in the front. A double shotgun refers to one structure for two families in which they share a central wall. The use of this model was widespread in poorer areas as its construction was fairly inexpensive.
Camelbacks, also known as humpbacks, have a second floor in the rear of the home. This design was one of the last in the heyday of shotgun construction. The floor plan is very similar to the traditional shotgun house, except there are stairs in the back leading up to the second floor. The second floor – the hump – can contain as many as four rooms. A single structure that’s twice the width of a normal shotgun is a double-width shotgun.
The early shotgun homes were built without bathrooms. Later on, a bathroom with a small hall was built before the last room of the house. The first two rooms were called double parlors and were characteristically separated by double pocket doors.
Most of the city’s stock of older shotgun homes was built at the turn of the 20th century and through the 1920s from resilient cypress wood. Shotgun homes are typically raised about 2 to 8 feet above the ground atop brick piers. They also feature a narrow front porch crowned with a roof apron and supported by columns and elaborate Victorian ornamentation. The rooms are relatively large – about 14 square feet – with high ceilings and decorative woodwork such as molding and ceiling medallions.
Though linked to poverty as they were ways to house multiple families cheaply and close to employers in the city, shotguns are charming and teeming with character. They have taken on a certain hipness and are quite fashionable among homebuyers. Shotguns that were originally built as two-family units are often renovated and converted into designer single-family homes. Restoring these historic gems is an effort to preserve history and this distinct style of architecture.
Editor’s Note
- Society + Culture
Errol Laborde
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It was 18 degrees in Missouri and I was freezing when I saw the job posting in New Orleans. There was ice on top of snow on top of more ice. There were no leaves on the trees; the sky had been gray since November; and it was King Cake season, and the Midwesterners didn’t care. My hands were so chapped they were bleeding. I’d been living in Missouri for a decade, yet I knew I would never get used to the winters or the food or the lack of Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest.
After Hurricane Katrina, when so many people were leaving the city, all I could think about was getting back. I kept talking myself out of it. What about the crime, I’d say, or the mosquitoes or the likelihood of another catastrophic hurricane? But there I was, looking for jobs in my beloved, broken hometown.
And now here I am, helming a magazine whose very title seemed like a joke to my friends in Missouri. “New Orleans Homes?” they scoffed. “Do you photograph FEMA
trailers or what?”
***
New Orleans never seemed that extraordinary when I was growing up here; it was just home. After I went away to college, though, it finally registered just how special this city was. And after Katrina, I realized just how hard we were going to have to fight to keep New Orleans from being just like anywhere else.
One thing that sets New Orleans apart is its homes, its quirky, funky, elegant, wonderful homes. In the awful days that followed the storm, I remember worrying that all of those homes were going to be bulldozed, replaced with shoddy construction that looked like Anytown, USA. It’s too soon to fully breathe a sigh of relief on that one, but I am happy to see that there is still a lot to celebrate in terms of homes. No, I don’t plan to feature FEMA trailers, though I am happy to see trailers rather than abandoned houses and hopeful that where FEMA trailers now stand, fabulous renovated homes will soon follow.
I feel very strongly that city magazines such as this one are vital to a city’s identity and morale, and I am thrilled to have a chance to play a part – however small – in the recovery of one of the most incredible and vibrant cities in America.
***
It was 75 degrees in New Orleans when I drove to my first day of work at Renaissance Publishing. Everything was green and blooming; there was King Cake in the break room; and when I returned home, my godmother surprised me with an enormous pot of beans and rice – it was Monday, after all.
So, honestly, I’m just trying not to worry about the crime or the mosquitoes or the likelihood of another catastrophic hurricane. Because I’m home. I’m home, and I’m warm, and I’m so very happy.
–Eve Kidd Crawford
We Have a New Editor
Eve Kidd Crawford is the new editor of New Orleans Homes & Lifestyles magazine.
Crawford, a New Orleans native, holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism. Her work experience includes editorial positions at Columbia Home and Jefferson City Home magazines.
Former editor Sue Strachan has accepted the position of public relations director for the Ogden Museum of Southern Art.
With the changes, New Orleans Homes & Lifestyles continues its commitment to being the leader in regional home coverage.
Worldwide Worries
Site Staff
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There ain’t no Modine Gunch p*rn site on the Internet.
And if there is one, it has nothing to do with me.
And if it does have something to do with me, I didn’t do it on purpose.
I got to explain.
I ain’t no computer genius like them hackers you hear about.
But this Christmas, my gentleman friend Lust got it into his head to surprise me with a personal computer.
And now, instead of picking up the phone and calling, my kids start e-mailing me to say they might fail algebra or be pregnant or go to Florida over spring break and want to charge it on my credit card. So I got to check e-mail every night before I read my St. Jude novena and go to bed.
Next, my daughter Gumdrop starts carrying on about how she misses the old days when she used to run over to her grandma Larda’s all the time. That was back when the whole family lived on the same street in Chalmette.
After Katrina, naturally, we all washed up in different places. I’m in an apartment in the French Quarter and Gumdrop and her little family are an hour-and-a-half away in Folsom.
She says she wishes my little granddaughter Lollipop and me could read stories and bake cookies together like she did with Ms. Larda. (What she actually did with Ms. Larda was watch the soaps and play gin rummy. I think she been brainwashed by the Family Channel.) Anyway, when she hears about my computer, she gets the brilliant idea to mail me a Web cam, so I can read stories to Lollipop.
A Web cam, in case you don’t know, is a tiny video camera. You install it on top of your computer and, once you get it set up right, you can sit in front of it and talk, and whoever you are talking to can see your lips moving and a couple seconds later, actually hear what you said.
After it comes, she phones and asks if I’m in front of it, so I take it out the box and sit in front of it and say yes. Then she starts telling me what little pictures to click on so we can see each other. I click on them and nothing happens. So she tells me again, and I click on them again, and nothing happens again … and this goes on for a long time. Then I hear Lollipop’s voice pipe up with something and Gumdrop says Lollipop thinks I should click some different pictures. I do what she says and all of a sudden there’s Gumdrop’s face on my screen, glaring at her computer. And there’s Lollipop at the bottom of the screen, on her mama’s lap, looking smug.
By now it’s past her bedtime – so I promise her a story tomorrow.
I lay awake thinking about how kids in this day and age learn to go online before they learn to go on the potty. I think that prenatal ultrasound test that their mamas all have – the one that tells whether they got a boy or a girl in there – also beams some extra cells into their little brains or maybe it installs a computer chip.
When I wake up next morning, I’ve slept though the alarm and am almost late for work. I just have time to throw off my nightshirt and jump into my clothes and shoot out the door.
I lead French Quarter tours and we end each tour at Lust’s bar, the Sloth Lounge. That evening, after my last tour, I sit down at the bar and start telling Mojo the bartender about the Web cam in my bedroom. He gives this little smirk and then leans over the bar and whispers he can connect me up with some hot adult Web cam sites. Now I ain’t stupid. I know “adult,” is another word for “dirty old men.” I explain I’m reading bedtime stories and he says, “So that’s what they’re calling it now.” I give up and stomp out.
When I get home, I hang up my clothes and am standing in front of the closet in my bra and panties, looking for something comfortable to put on, when I notice a blinking light out of the corner of my eye. And I realize. It’s the Web cam. I never turned it off last night. I’m online.
I throw myself on the floor and crawl under the desk and pull out the computer plug. Then I stand up and peer at the camera eye. It ain’t off. It switched to battery power. I drop to the floor again and slither into the closet, shut the door and feel around until I find some jeans and a sweatshirt and I get them on. Then I come out and tell the computer, “Delete. Everything. Immediately.” It keeps on blinking. I hold down the power button. It goes off – I think. For good measure, I put a sock over that eye.
Then I call Gumdrop. She says I got nothing to worry about, because she set us up on a secure network. Except, of course for hackers.
Hackers?
Well, if it weren’t for Lollipop, that Web cam would have gone sailing out the window right then. But I promised.
So that night, I read Lollipop her story and we play us a little gin rummy when her mother’s out of the room. Then I tell her good night.
And then, before I press the power button, I read my St. Jude novena to the hackers and tell them good night.
So what if I ain’t a computer genius. I can outsmart certain adults.
On the Cover
- Society + Culture
Lolis Eric Elie
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When flowers across New Orleans begin to stretch their petals outward, it must be time for Art in Bloom. A joint project by the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Garden Study Club of New 
Orleans, this year’s theme is: “Merci Bien: A Bouquet of Thanks” –a thank-you to the many people and organizations around the country and the world that have aided in New Orleans’ recovery. Chairwomen Dana Hansel and Anne Redd, vice president of the Garden Study Club, Susu Stall and director of NOMA, E. John Bullard, are sure to see to it that this year, Art in Bloom’s 20th anniversary, will be sure to wow and delight April 2-6 at the New Orleans Museum of Art.
One special touch is an original mixed media piece by George Rodrigue depicting his famous Blue Dog amid a sea of flowers. This special piece will be auctioned off at the Patron and Preview Party, Wednesday, April 2.
The main event takes place the next day, Thursday, April 3, with two lectures, given by Dorothy McDaniel and Ian Prosser, and a luncheon complete with Saks Fifth Avenue fashion show following.
For information and tickets, call 658-4121 or visit
www.noma.org/AIBtickets.html
Photographed by Greg Miles
Photographed at Urban Earth
Many thanks to George Rodrigue and to James Clawson, Roland Montealegre and all the staff at Urban Earth.
Valentine’s Day Sparkles of a Different Sort
- History
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There was something in the air on Valentine’s Day, 1895 – and it wasn’t just love. Though we may not be unfamiliar to strange weather patterns, it was still a surprise when a snowstorm occurred in February in New Orleans.
Snow fell on the mouth of the Mississippi River and even places as far away as Houston were sprinkled – Houston received 22 inches of snow, while New Orleans received nine.
The city was turned into a virtual playground; children bundled up and played outside all day, streetcars were stopped and the city glistened and sparkled in white.
One of the next times New Orleans would receive such heavy snow was Dec. 31, 1963. However, that day in 1895 when Cupid’s arrow pierced the sky, causing snowflakes to fall upon New Orleans, was something that undoubtedly gave residents something to love – a day to sit back and enjoy the frosty weather.
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