Parting Is Such Virtual Reality (TOTC, Day 8)

It's the last day, and like any last day of any vacation, that's all sorts of sad. But this seems particularly so, as a week in New Orleans is a week of finding a town's soul. No place seems so lived in and yet big enough to give you a space to live there too. It's too ripe, too raw, too lovely, too lost. Delicious and delirious in its dishabille.

There's even a spot like this:

And our friend Voodoo Bone Lady told us a great story about it that we can only hope is true. Supposedly that painting on the wall a husband bought for his wife and hid in the attic to give her as a surprise. That was 2005. Their house was completely flooded by Katrina, except for the attic, where the painting was secretly stored away. The couple moved to the French Quarter, which remained unflooded, post-Katrina. Then, one day their house collapsed; luckily no one was hurt. The only thing left standing--the painting and the vanity underneath it. So--is the painting lucky, a survivor of two calamities? Or is the painting a curse, a cause? The owner's going to leave it hang. But curse or cause is the ever confusing question, isn't it, especially in a city like New Orleans. You tell me what a cocktail is, for instance.

While I wait for your answer, let's go to breakfast. We head back into the CBD, this time to a place even more a neighborhood joint, Majoria's Commerce Restaurant. Despite not being local, we're greatly greeted and even better fed. I have their breakfast biscuit poured deep in a cheese sauce that gives cardiologists nightmares, rich with jalapeno and sausage and "seasonings," a spicy that ratchets up the temperature of your whole body, not your mouth. Of course, two eggs over easy over the top. It's sloppily scrumptious, the biscuits still firm enough to hold all that sop. And it's all of $5.50. Now that's a delicious deal.

We spend the rest of the morning just walking, taking it in, wishing to leave a bit of our spirits somewhere somehow too. We think about doing some quick museum-ing, but the Cabildo and Presbytere are both closed Mondays. So we do a quick peek into the St. Louis Cathedral, that is the center of the center of the Vieux Carre, and catches clouds.

Don't tell my dead mother, but I'm long gone from the Catholic church (ok, she knew even before passing, sorry, Mom), but that doesn't stop me from being a bit gobsmacked in the midst of mans' tribute to the holy. I mean, clearly people had to believe to build places like this, or I hope so. I mean, we need faith in something, although I sort of wish it was each other and not a super power that can be as indifferent to whip a Katrina on us.

Of course, we also paint pretty to sell our wares, so maybe faith is sold at fifty cents a line. This low-relief skyline enchants me either way.

And we opt to close very much tourists, at JAX Brewhouse, in a building that was clearly much more a brewery once, and now is a sort of sad mall-ish thing, if right on the Mississippi. You see, usually it's hard to see the river from the Quarter as the levee blocks your views (don't complain, it keeps you on dry land, too). But the Brewhouse is on the second floor, so you get a sweeping view. Plus they had a TV on with closed caption, and who knew that General Hospital was still such a dramatic thing? I mean, gun-point hostage situations on a Monday? The world is too accelerated. We need beer samplers at 1 pm on sticky days. And the Natchez, so close, yet so Twain.

Luckily, there's one last very Tales moment. Hendricks Gin has opted to provide an exit bar, even taking people to the airport afterward. It's at Sucre, which we'd passed some in our travels but unfortunately never visited because gorgeous macarons.You get four different cocktails and could have chair massages, but without handcuffs and blindfolds so what's the point, but even better there are virtual reality booths, which are pretty amazing if really just the most hyped-up ad you've ever experienced: you even get scent wafted at you and handed a drink at a planned time. If the future is all sell, but this good, I surrender.

I'd Write You a Poem if I Could Put this Bottle Down (TOTC, Day 7)

Tales, alas, is more or less over by Sunday. But we don't leave until Monday, and that means we get to have one more amazing New Orleans day. In fact, it's been kind of sad we haven't taken advantage of the breakfasts this too-generous town has to offer, for the most part. So today we do, wandering into the CBD.

What's a CBD, you ask? The Central Business District, which from the Monteleone out the Quarter is really only a few blocks across Canal, but it's a very different world. For of the three words that make up CBD, one I'm neutral about, but the first two aren't usually things that give me warm feelies. Still, there's some cool stuff that-a-way. Like the Ruby Slipper Cafe, a little southern mini-chain, but also mostly delectable. Or make that liquid-able, as you can see here.

We simply did not have enough Bloodys this trip, but if that's the worst thing you can say about a trip.... Bacon in them is a good idea. (Bacon in your socks might be a good idea. Go, bacon!) And is there anything more pleasing than a pickled green bean, it's flat flavor lifted by vinegar and salt? You do want the BBQ shrimp and grits. The special I had with a biscuit proved that horrible biscuit conundrum--too often the reality of biscuit never matches the biscuit dream. Still, a fine spot.

And while the CBD tends to have more new buildings, more late 20th century hotel, more of less interest, there's still spots like this, as you never escape New Orleans no matter where you are in it. That's part of its magic.

Before we headed out to be poetic, we had to hit a place across the street from the Bienville House that had intrigued us (we are easy)--Evangeline.  We don't need anything, don't want much, but it's New Orleans, temptress, and vacation, idealization, and a gorgeous spot, easily romanced. The bartender, sort of a blond Julianne Moore, chats a lot, sells us beers. I get a Southern Prohibition Brewing Mississippi Fire Ant Imperial Red Ale, lots of caramel-rich malt with plenty of hops to balance. Chryss gets the Tin Roof Watermelon Wheat, a special that ends up in a can (a bit of a surprise), but still super refreshing and not too sweet given, well, watermelon.

So. This coming afternoon, thanks to our friends Melinda and Steve from Liuzza's day, we're going to be featured readers at the Maple Leaf Bar. That means Chryss needs a pedicure. (You do know how poetry works, don't you?) While she does that, I wander about and end up at the last Monteleone event, Ya-Ka-Mein by Miss Linda. I won't be able to do Ya-Ka-Mein justice in a couple of sentences, as it's a culture clash of deliciously epic proportions, and has many varieties and proponents. Miss Linda is particularly famous as she's been on national TV (thanks, Chopped!), and her mix was brilliantly spicy without any overpowering hot, and deep deep deep. It certainly packed a flavor punch that helped wash away the rest of the week, so seemed perfect as the food for the Sunday blessing.

OK, then the poetry, you don't need to know a lot about. I read, Chryss read better, there was open mic. It was a crazy honor to be part of this, since this event is the longest continuously running poetry reading series in North America. All props to Nancy Harris who runs it now, weekly. (Do you know what it means to run a weekly poetry series?) I also didn't realize, as I go into that weird fugue state of "oh shit I'm reading poems soon," that one of the audience members was Rodney Jones, one of my favorite poets--tell me this isn't one of the best poems ever. I am forever grateful I didn't realize who I was introduced to before the reading. I hope I didn't offend you, Rodney, with my poems.

After the event Chryss, Nancy, Melinda, Steve, and I all went to one of New Orleans' long-standing best neighborhood spots--Upperline--for dinner. Even better, since Melinda calls ahead, seems to be a bit of a semi-regular, and stresses our Santa Barbara ties, we get sat next to a haunting bayou photograph by Louisiana native/Santa Barbara resident Nell Campbell. That she took the photographs at our wedding certainly makes us feel a bit more welcome than most restaurants could. Restaurateur JoAnn Clevenger goes on and on about Nell, and we completely understand.

And if that perfect bonding welcome wasn't enough, there was the food. Not that everything can't be lovely here, a place that invented the now standard Creole dish fried green tomato with shrimp remoulade (be sure you read that deliciousness really slowly--go back if you have to), but it was also Garlic Fest. Rule 1 of Garlic Fest: everyone must partake of Garlic Fest. Luckily, we met that rule.

There were special martinis, made with things like Dorothy Parker gin (see this day's entry).  Then delights like heirloom tomato gazpacho with crab guacamole and garlic crisps--as flavorful as something that light and refreshing could be--and spicy shrimp with jalapeno cornbread and aioli--and those are just course one. For mains Chryss had eggplant and creole squash shrimp boats a la Muddy Waters, which involved the lightest flash fry, very summer eggplants and squash, and perfect shrimp. And I, well, I might have had my favorite duck dish ever. Skin crispy/crunchy, fat rendered, meat tender and not the slightest bit over-cooked. And then the sauce, a port-garlic brilliance I might wear as a cologne. You also get a little cast iron pan of luscious yam-meets-pecan side with that. I so want more right now.

There is still an ice cream sundae with garlic roasted in honey, and that oddly works. Nancy gets a Brandy Alexander as her dessert, and that's so New Orleans. This couldn't be a better last night dinner to celebrate both the brilliance, taste, and extravagance of the week of Tales.

We get back to the Quarter, realize it's our last night, and go out again as it's not too late and, hey, it's the last night! One stop is at the Bombay Club, home of a gazillion martinis, and we fall in love with their coupes and like their drinks too; if you get this The Bombay Club Martini, it's made with Old Raj Gin, Cocchi Vermouth di Torino, Luxardo, Maraschino Liqueur, and Regans’ Orange Bitters, with an orange twist and tastes a tad sweet for something martini-esque but looks lovely like this:

And, of course, as our last night in town we have to go to the Carousel Bar one last time. This time we get to ride the carousel itself, slowly circling our friends the barkeeps. It's still surprisingly lively, as just enough of the tails of Tales are kicking about. But this ride is about history, about so much aboutness--the words, the proof, the taste, the forgotten, the made up and re-remembered and the joy that our lives are the fictions we get to tell, even if they happened, almost just like that. I promise you the truth, if you just buy the next round.

Bakery by the Beach

The latest venture for The Lark complex is Helena Avenue Bakery, for who doesn’t need some more scrumptious reasons to devour butter? “The need for a bakery became quickly apparent as the Funk Zone neighborhood unfolded,” explains Sherry Villanueva, managing partner for Acme Hospitality, which operates the entire property. “We were excited to create a daytime, wholesome food venue that would serve the needs of our own businesses while giving people another reason to visit the area. We loved the idea of bringing more families down to the neighborhood and to tie our businesses more closely to the beach area.”

Want to read the rest then do so at the Independent's site.

Far from Frou Frou: Finch & Fork Cocktails

If you're tired of too much frou frou at the bar--did the barkeep just use an atomizer to spray something in the general vicinity of my glass?--head on down to Finch & Fork at the Canary. There's a new head drink sheriff in town, Joe Dohany, born in Philly, most recently from Seattle, and he's a classicist a heart. Part of that is he went to culinary school, so thinks in chefly ways. What will make something taste good? What are the fewest ingredients to get there? What's the history of this delectable concoction?

Take his local twist--and there's the chef part again, plus a tip of the cap to his compatriot at Finch & Fork, the talented chef James Siao, striving to do the fresh and local bit anyone who's any good does now--on the Vesper. He makes it with both local gin and local vodka, Calyx from Ascendant and Cutler's Vodka. That Calyx is something--Ascendant's distiller Steve Gertman works with Raj Paar, of all people, to craft a winemaker's approach to gin, so much so they even give each batch a year designation (more to admit they might play with the botanical mix or land different sourcing year-to-year). And, to top it off, Dohany uses Cochi Americano instead of Lillet, for he says Lillet changed its formula since the classic Ian Flemming Bond days, so it's sweeter now. That Cochi Americano makes the drink quite dry and unique, especially if you're used to ordering Lillet-made Vespers.

"My goal is to help make the spot one cohesive place," Dohany says, "to make the restaurant and bar one brand. I want the bar to be a place the locals can come in to have a few drinks, maybe some food and drinks, or just have some fun." He also has some sharp observations between the Seattle and Santa Barbara bar scenes, claiming, "Seattle is much more spirit-forward, with that sense 'we dink Frenet all the time.' Here drinks are lighter, more refreshing, easier. It's about cheerful cocktails versus brooding cocktails."

Perhaps the best of his new lot (and the menu still features favorites like the Figueroa, Guava Margarita, and Delayed Flight) is the Witch's Back, a more crafted Perfect Greyhound, perhaps, with Bulldog gin, Strega, pamplemousse rose, lime, and orange bitters. So certainly you get the citrus with the grapefruit and orange, but the Strega--which is witch in Italian--adds its unusual herbal oomph of pine and mint to confound things in a fascinating way. Dohany garnishes the drink with a rosemary sprig across the up glass's rim, so you get that scent right in your nostrils each sip, too. Lovely.

Flutter Press: NEW RELEASE: Feast Days

Flutter Press: NEW RELEASE: Feast Days by George Yatchisin:want to hear me wax poetic about food, wine, drink? Check out this poetry chapbook you can order now. Please.

Eat This: Squash Blossoms @ Toma

As foods that seem too precious to do at home go, squash blossoms are high on the list—they seem mighty sensitive and tender for a stuffing. So I like ordering them out, and there are none better than the ones that Toma is serving right now, for a host of reasons.

Want to read the rest then do so at the Independent's site.

Summoning Southern Spirits (TOTC 2016, Day 6)

We Sweat Socially for the last time, and parting is such damp sorrow. We Kick Start Coffee for the last time, and don't say thanks a latte, because we're not that lame. There's a room full of Anchor Distilling drinks, but we don't linger as it's not even 11 am and we have not eaten. See, Tales teaches you many things.

We do shower up and get dressed for Beignets on the Balcony by William Grant & Sons. It's in the Sonesta, the other hotel housing many of TOTC's events, and you wind up wandering through a warren of rooms and indeed balconies overlooking Bourbon Street. This would be prized real estate for Mardi Gras, but on a rainy July morning even most of the vomit has packed up and gone home, making what will be party central in 10 hours look more like a neon-lit ghost town.

The beignets are good, the eggs better, the cocktails best, particularity an Opera made of The Balvenie 14 year old Caribbean cask (I told you to Sip That back in April), lemon juice, pear brandy, elderflower liqueur, simple syrup, and topped with sparkling wine. Think French 75 squared or something, a lovely brunchish pour. That event ends up being the end of our official Tales day, except for a quick trip to the top floor of the Monteleone, hoping for good things in the Interview Room. Instead we got this view--they need to buy some letters, Vanna, or perhaps someone has a hankering for the original Let's Make a Deal host. (The last sentence brought to you by the International Association of Game Shows.)

It's time for a crosstown adventure! First, if you opt to take the streetcars, and you really sort of have to, you can buy a pass before trying to board. Do that. (We didn't.) Second, get ready for too many people with the same idea, and a crush, and heat, and grumble grumble. But then it gets moving, and you might get to hear the operator crack wise, and you might get views like this as you head out into the Garden District.

So it's all sorts of good. We decide it might be fun to wander about Audubon Park, so get off there and keep our fingers crossed that a typical afternoon rainstorm doesn't let loose on us. The first part of the park is still very much in its original Olmsted design, and so so much green to confront folks like us living in rain-starved southern California.

Also, here's the obligatory photo of moss.

That beats both Randy and Kate. We end up walking all the way from St. Charles to the Mississippi, around the zoo which we decide not to see. As for the park, it's an impressive taming of nature with equally impressive houses of the rich alongside. You know, America. It is a long walk, and everything past Magazine St. is far less scenic (the Olmsteds mustn't have been paid for that part) and very treeless. It is not sunless. We are not sweatless, even with mighty clouds like this.

Note, too, the river is intimidatingly wide and hinting at its real use as a highway and not something one should particularly romance. It's easy to agree, however, it's nicknamed well--that's about as unclear as water can be, Mighty Muddy M. That could be something jumping out of it, too.

We start the long hike back to Charles St., and get to see these critters along the way.

Being us, and given half of us is Chryss, we're nowhere near done walking, despite needing food and drink, and by drink we mostly even just mean water, so you know this was a long walk. We cross St. Charles and head for Freret, which, of course, we call Ferret, because the furry devils need their own street. Our goal is what often gets called the best craft cocktail bar in New Orleans--Cure--and we get there right as they open at 3, so luckily we do not enter crying, even though our tears would probably have been hidden amidst our perspiration. They let us in anyway.

There is the tiniest bit of 'tude here, but they seem to deserve it as they make outstanding cocktails and are just friendly enough. They describe their own creations by comparing them to a drink theirs is sort of like, to give you a handle of where to head. So I get a Sweet Leaf that's a cousin to a Corpse Reviver #2 that is divine and Chryss has an Irish Goodbye, which is described as follows: "Perfect for a hot day, this restorative Irish whiskey sour has notes of peach, mint, and green tea."

We also hunger, and get a bar snack platter of olives and crudite and a pimento cheese spread that makes me wonder where pimentos have been of late. I will be having more. To do further cocktail research--I am a journalist, after all--I have a second drink, this time an Alaska (what more could one want on a hot day), made of City of London Gin, Yellow Chartreuse, Regans' Orange Bitters. Perfect simplicity. (Another big Cure plus--despite being one of the town's hot spots, most drinks are just $10. Put them in LA or Santa Barbara and their creations would cost at least $15.)

Chryss does some internet sleuthing and discovers that Bar Frances, just down the street (this stretch of Freret is particularly hip right now) is supposed to be something, so we decide to go there too. Hey, we missed lunch, don't judge. It's quite pleasing, too, and our waitress here turns out to be from Santa Barbara, of course. Happy hour Marcona almonds for three bucks are saltily nice, and I order a Boulevardier cocktail as I like the way it throws whiskey into a Negroni, or perhaps it throws Campari into a Manhattan. That is, it's almost so many other drinks but really only itself. Chryss goes for a local microbrew for the name as much as anything, Southern Prohibition Brewing's Jack the Sipper ESB. It reminded me what a pleasing style ESB is, but of course, the English just don't hop enough for us Americans.

I do not know, by the way, why I have no photos of this chunk of the day.

We work our way back to the streetcar and take it back to the Quarter, passing all the ornate houses that make much of the Garden District seem like a set for a Southern Gothic soap opera--These Are the Days of Our Columns. (I hope that's suggestive enough.) Somehow I can't remember at this point if we go straight to the dinner we've been slowly building to with drink after snack-accompanies drink, but it seems as good a way to experience New Orleans as any.

Dinner is far from glamorous--it's the walkup window of Killer Poboys, think of it as a food truck parked permanently in the back room of the Erin Rose Bar. You can't have too many poboys, and they also mean you get to eat cheap. Chryss goes for the Seared Gulf Shrimp with marinated radish, carrot, cucumber, herbs, and special sauce while I go for their famous “Dark & Stormy” Pork Belly long-marinated and re-brushed with NOLA rum ginger glaze and topped with lime slaw and garlic aioli. These are incredible flavor bombs and go well with some southern beers from the bar up front.

There might be time for a nap. Because at 8 we meet our wonderful neighbors from SB, who just happen to be in New Orleans for one night only, and they're booked for the Ultimate 5-in-1 Haunted Tour Experience with the Voodoo Bone Lady. Given these are our neighbors that also take Halloween seriously in ways that might scare others as they decorate their house so well people come out of their way to see it, of course nothing could be better than to do a ghost tour with them. It's practically research.

Guess who? She's an incredible story teller, which is just what you want for something like this, because while the Quarter can seem spooktacular--most of the buildings are hundreds of years old, the gas lamps flicker, even for rent signs advise whether a condo is haunted or not--the scariest thing you'll probably see is some 21-year-old chucking up his fifth Hurricane.

You do get touchdown Jesus, who supposedly helped the Saints win a Super Bowl. Or, perhaps, it just helps make Christianity creepier than it is in towns that aren't in no small part built on the slave trade.

We do get a drink/bathroom break at Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop Bar, to get our pirates into the story, of course. It's supposed to be the oldest building used as a bar in the U.S., a couple of decades before we were the U.S. It is wonderfully ramshackle and creepy and candlelit except for the video poker machine or two. I mean, you can't ignore all uses of electricity. Oh, did Lafitte really having anything to do with this spot? We don't know. But if we claim it, and keep the corners properly in the shadows, anything can seem possible.

And, of course, the tour ends at the infamous LaLaurie House that American Horror Story made a national, overly graphic excuse to see if Kathy Bates could over-act more than Jessica Lange (was tv-watching America winners or losers, you decide). You know, the usual torture the slaves thing for your own sadistic thrills. And then, the house supposedly wasn't too welcoming--even one-time owner Nicolas Cage found the power of the haunting, even if it used the IRS to get him. We don' see anything spooky here, even in our photos. But the stories are terrifying enough.

So much so after saying goodbye to the neighbors, who are visiting with their teenagers, we decide we need a nightcap and return to Kingfish from our first night in town. I have to have that First Word again, it was so good. Less good are the other, of course younger, people at the bar who are so witty they must yell their bon-mots at each other, then laugh as if they learned how to do so by watching the cartoon ass on Hee-Haw. Even the people behind the bar are rolling their eyes, to the point they give us a drink for free, saying, "It took me too long to get you your drink." Now that's service. They do finally leave, and the volume change is almost like exiting the rock nightclub and suddenyl just hearing nothing.

Even better, our friend (thanks to our daughter) Laura Bellucci from SoBou is doing what bartenders do post shift, knocking back shots of Fernet-Branca, especially since one of the Kingfish bartenders is her beau. So we get to, on pretty much the last evening of Tales, join the honorary ranks of barkeeps ourselves. There's nothing bitter about this amaro in the slightest.