New Orleans, This June 2011

From the moment of our arrival last week, we absorbed ourselves in the multi-sensory experience that is life in New Orleans: the perfume of river rich soil, dampness, life teeming among the constantly brewing and spreading green growth of tree, vine, and flower; the humidity that mists our hair and graces our skin; the color that thrives everywhere--the blossoms of crepe myrtles reflected in the aftermath of an afternoon rainstorm, ripple-less puddles holding still and perfect to mirror pink petals and twisting, cream-colored trunks. On the levee, we listened to the engines of tugboats groan and roar against the strain of moving barges upriver. Herons, cranes, and pelicans called to one another as they broke into the open sky from the sanctuary near the river edge. Here beyond levee and river bank, ancient cottages with delicately carved scrollwork and filigree lean into one another under the weight of Louisiana sun, paint colors burning against pale blue sky, and yards flanked with emerald palmetto, frond, and fern with bursting purple, pink, blue, and white blooms in shapes of every kind tucked between. Sidewalk heaves away from the wandering roots of oak and magnolia. Cemetery walls cradle fern in  the cracks of white-washed stucco and brick. Shade and mottled light lessens the burden of afternoon sun. Clean-lined and playfully modern architecture sparkles like diamonds where old cottages gave way to the fatal surge of water six years ago.

This is the city I remember, the one that saturates the senses. New Orleans with her full skirts, heavily hued, breathing against the sultry wet air that river, lake, and gulf sweep her with. Tendrils of vine curl about her waist and flowers twist throughout her hair. Faulkner once described her as aging gracefully in the dark, but I see her as rebuilding her prime years once again, fostering newness with the break of spring into summer.

Familiar

A day in New Orleans includes the following routine: lounging over coffee while discussing what to eat for lunch, and at lunch discussing where to dine later. What I haven’t mentioned is that while indulging in those meals or on the way to the next one, I cannot walk ten steps there without running into a friend or relative. New Orleans isn’t a city, it’s a river town--the banks that hug the bend of land and water being much like our snug connection with each other.


Friday morning, my father and I had a coffee date at Still Perkin’. Located uptown at the edge of Lafayette Cemetery and a block from the famed Commander’s Palace, Still Perkin’ attracts mostly locals. Dad and I rolled in chatting, and there standing with a small group of people, not moments after I just wondered aloud who we might bump into, was a woman whose child I used to babysit and who used to teach at my high school. In fact, she is running for some kind of political office and works for the mayor now. After coffee, we headed into the lobby that Still Perkin’ shares with a half dozen independently owned businesses. I entered a store managed by a distant, distant relative who, as it turned out, keeps in solid touch with my uncles. If you are seeking anonymity, New Orleans is not the place to be.

Meanwhile, my husband was introducing a paper at his conference and shaking hands with colleagues. He ran into friends of my parents. These friends live out of state. Seeing as how a joyful reunion was in order, we all paraded to Palace Café on Canal Street for lunch between conference sessions. My sister, who also lives out of state and whose work and travel commitments nearby had been cancelled on short notice, also had managed to grace us with her presence that day. A wonderful waiter doted on the seven of us. Something he said sparked my curiosity and I started gently probing for his background. The waiter once had owned two big restaurants in Denver, where my husband happened to have been a customer in those years there.

At one point, the waiter, telling us his incredible story about his return to New Orleans after years of entrepreneurship and a life-changing heart attack, stepped back and threw his hands up in the air and exclaimed, “I love life!” This is the New Orleans I love—the social engagement over plates of steaming gourmet, the vigorous exchange of commonality and affection, the joyful celebration of life.

Sitting here this morning, quietly nursing the lingering and frustrating effects of illness, I wish I were back at Still Perkin’--at a table boasting café au lait and brioche, with seats cradling my family. Views from broad windows there include the long alternately blanched and shadowed wall of the cemetery, the elegant decay of aging Mediterranean-inspired French cottages, and a stray tourist or two wandering. I often miss the comfort of being somewhere so elegant and familiar, where I was entirely known from childhood and welcomed, a place where so-and-so “went to schoo’ wit’ ya mama”. Maybe those days will come again.

Let me tell you what we ate...

New Orleans probably added a few pounds to my frame this past week and it was well worth the indulgence. I love food. I love it better in good company. Fortunately this past week, I was able to share my favorite dishes and some new ones with two of my favorite people, my parents, but with every bite I was dying to call my chief favorite foodie, my husband, and exclaim, “You should be eating this.” In fact, I think I did a time or two. My mother still laughs about the time my father called her at 2 AM from a business trip across the country. In those days, we had no cell phones. Unobtrusive texting was not an option.


“Are you all right?” she asked with sleep in her eyes.

“You would not believe what I ate for dinner,” he said. And so it goes.

In New Orleans, we revel not just in what we eat, but how we eat, when we eat, where we eat, and with whom we eat. When we are enjoying one meal, we are planning the next. Last year, at a snowball stand (shaved ice to you yanks out there), two young women were discussing their evening. They were half-way through generous cups of snowballs when I overheard this classic:

“What do you want to do after this?” asked one girl.

“Let’s go get dinner.” As we say down there, for true. Yes, normal people eat dessert after dinner. Then, there’s us. This conversation is not uncommon. Two visits ago, I dawdled over morning coffee with my dad and planned lunch. At lunch, we planned coffee. At coffee, we planned dinner. After dinner, we discussed all our meals and the quality of the coffee over more coffee. No wonder I come home so bloated.

Last night, Jay the Piper, who blogs over at The Extended Table, zapped me online demanding a list of what I ate. Are you ready for this? Oysters Bienville, fried oyster po boys, boiled crawfish, rabbit gumbo, smoked chicken gumbo, ahi tuna, assorted pates, roasted pork tenderloin, creamed spinach, petit fillet, fried green tomatoes, almond croissants, chocolate Florentines, quality goat cheese, brie, camembert, and one cinnamon roll. Oh, I forgot to add the bread, the butter, onion straws, and wine to that. And coffee, of course.

While each meal warrants its own blog, let’s just say that the most impressionable oyster came from Houston’s on St. Charles. Flash fried in a light breading and served over a creamy spinach base, I could still taste the gulf waters in its feathery folds. It was light and full bodied at the same time. The onion straws from Charley’s on Dryades were particularly noteworthy—as was the entire evening that went with it, another story for another blog. The crawfish were perfectly spiced and boiled over in River Ridge at a different eatery named Charlie’s, a restaurant purchased as a measure to preserve the neighborhood (God bless you, New Orleans). And I hit Still Perkin’ for a granita just in time to have another outstanding social experience.

The greatest thing about all of this is the sharing. A table full of New Orleanians, especially those of us with whom we claim favorite, is beautiful and gracious. We split entrees, dole out portions, exclaim over tastes, share nibbles, share opinions on those nibbles, admire exquisitely arranged food, and relax in the comfort of full tummies and gentle people. Talk is intimate. Surface chatter disappears really before the first glass of wine is poured. Coffee is an excuse to lounge about the table long after the waiter and his curious little table crumber have disappeared. But because it is New Orleans, maybe he does not disappear for long. The waiter comes back, with friends who you discover you knew through school or lived near or scarier yet, are related. Conversation renews in the perfume of marjoram, thyme, wine, and chocolate that seems to linger after the plates are gone. The table linens soften underhand and light begins to shift outside, or maybe the sky is already dark. After all, two hours have passed since the waiter first slid a cup of gumbo under your nose. We clatter onto the sidewalk, exchange goodbyes for the tenth time, and leave… craving coffee or tea or a nap… and missing already the lovely company with whom the meal was shared. Or, like me, picking up the phone to call whoever was supposed to be there and could not come.

“Baby, you would not believe what I just ate.”

Life Along the River: the Lure of the Land

I  have written before why New Orleanians are New Orleanians, why we live here, why when we don't we wish we did-- oh, maybe that was a post as a guest on my better half's blog. I tell  you what... here I sit yards from a levee that flanks a bend in the Mississippi, and I could just slap myself. Why, oh why, did I ever leave? Today I will write about just one part of this visit, just one reason why I'll have a hard time leaving at the end of the week. But there is more to come. So far being here has been an incredible bath in Louisiana culture. Much to say, much to consider, much to love.

Yesterday, my father and I spent part of the day walking the levee and exploring the batcher, which for you inlanders, is a strip of bog between river and higher land. The batture (pronounced batcher) fills and drains with river water according to season, weather, or time of day. It is a smidgeon of wildlife preserve, but somehow in that small space teems with multiple species of ducks and egrets who preen, pick, and bask in the dappled shade of vine, swamp willow, and cypress. There are traces of deer, rumors of boar, and hints of possum visits. My father and I wandered down a dry rise of land laced with shallow ponds of crawfish. We navigated rolls of dried mud which city workers piled to keep cars from the driving headlong into river. Poking our way with a long stick to fend off any wayward snakes, we made our way to the bottom where river lapped in a clearing of delicate willow. A dark-feathered duck slid gracefully from sky into water, then swam busily away as we stood to skip rocks and watch barge traffic. I saw a species of bird I have never once seen before here, a blue crane of sorts, and I could hear bustling in the wooded area behind me-- critters that scamper, peek out, and scurry away again.

When  we hiked our way back up to the paved trail on the levee, we visually explored the expansive view: a series of parked barge anchors left to rust on the higher bank of an industrial site, dredging equipment, the turn of the levee that protected clusters of modest  homes, backyards full of azaleas in every shade of red, pink, and white, an artist's studio with attached aviary, a red barn, and lush stands of spring-green cypress, massive oaks, magnolia, and fruit trees. The air is rich with flora and river. Even the water-churned soil adds a palpable tinge of breathable earth. This aroma, the slipping, patting sound of moving water, the humming dredge in the distance, the taste of  river-scent are like the beckoning sirens of Greek lore calling, luring, gently pulling me to stay here.

If I could I would. The city of New Orleans engages me enough, but add to that the romance of bayou country... sigh, deep sighs. Just wait till I tell you what I've been eating.