This longtime restaurant spot visible from the south side of Manchester Road at I-270 has been taken over by Ron Gordon, former owner of Wildhorse Grill, and turned into a Cajun/Creole bar and restaurant. On weekends (Friday and Saturday), live music is a big draw, with long waits possible for a table and a $5 cover charge. The space is one cavernous room with few decor elements—a large wooden bar, a mural of Blues musical greats, glass sidelights on one wall—making it more about the music and the jambalaya than the ambience.
A big draw, no doubt, is former Eleven Eleven Mississippi chef Wade Waller. He has built a menu crafted around Big Easy cuisine that falls squarely into the category of comfort food, with homestyle dishes like shrimp and grits, blackened salmon, short ribs and stuffed pork chops. You will definitely find gumbo, po’boys, jambalaya and etouffe, but dishes like mushroom risotto and scallop chicken pasta elevate the food here quite a bit beyond the typical Creole mold.
The Creole Fisherman Stew ($25), which we shared as a starter, had intense and spicy seafood flavor. A generous fillet of mahi-mahi sat atop a bowlful of tomato broth with crab, shrimp, mussels and scallops. The Stuffed Pork Chop ($23), in the entrees column, was flavorful, with a nice serving of fresh crabmeat stuffing, but the artichokes and spinach promised on the menu were nowhere to be found. Fortunately, the side dish of sweet potato and apple hash made up for the mysterious omission; the cubes of sweet potato and apple were generously browned in oil and delicious. An accompanying house-made barbecue sauce was also good, full of sweet and spicy flavors.
The Oyster Po’Boy ($12) had the requisite thick and flaky crust on the oysters and came with chipotle aioli on a nice hoagie bun. You get a choice of sides, and I had some very good creamy slaw. Excellent was the Short Ribs meal ($23), three thick slices of the richly marbled meat, which were admirably lean for this cut. They had enough fat to be flavorful, but not so much that we were eating mouthfuls of grease. And the dish’s sides worked well: bitter greens to tone down the fat and red pepper grits to add some spice.
Similarly well-paired was the Blackened Salmon and its accompaniments: roasted spaghetti squash, broccoli and charred onion veloute. The fish had a good sprinkling of peppery spices and was cooked just to tender. The squash strands were buttery, and the broccoli was a bit crunchy. All were enhanced by the creamy white sauce. Beignets with raspberry sauce ($5) made a fitting end to the meal: cakey, dense and delicious.
[amuse bouche]
the scene | New Orleans-y dining and music spot
the chef | Wade Waller
the prices | $8 to $13 starters, $9 to $12 sandwiches, $11 to $25 entrees
the favorites | Creole Fisherman Stew, Stuffed Pork Chop, Blackened Salmon, Short Ribs
[chef chat] » wade waller
pedigree | Johnson & Wales, College of Culinary Arts in Charlotte, North Carolina
favorite ingredient | Bacon
favorite local restaurant | Cleveland-Heath
favorite cookbook | The French Laundry Cookbook by Thomas Keller
most memorable dining experience | A seafood place in Cape Canaveral. We sat on the dock and ate seafood appetizers for about 3 hours.
guilty pleasure food | Raw oysters on the half shell; I could eat a dozen at a time.
1090 old des peres road | 314.858.1188
Photos: Bill Barrett
