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| Picture courtesy of the restaurant website |
575 Convention Center Blvd, New Orleans, Louisiana 70130
Overall Ratings (H in orange, C in purple)
Food: C / B+
Ambiance: B / B+
Service: B+ / A
Drinks: B
Overall Experience: C / B+
H says, Okay, I’ll go right out and say it: Not A Fan. I was not impressed in the least and I felt the food was pretty bad for a New Orleans restaurant. If perhaps I was living in Durham, I could see going back, but the food here is just not worth my time. Honestly. Go to Bacchanal or Adolfo's. Both are in the same price range, same fanciness level and have infinitely better food.
C says, We went out to dinner with a couple of Henry’s co-workers to Grand Isle, which is convenient to the convention center and Harrah’s. The meal was not bad, but nothing really special. There are so many other restaurants that we love in town that I doubt we’ll be back, but it’s a fairly affordable restaurant with quick service; if you’re in town for a convention, you could probably do worse.
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| Picture from the restaurant website |
Overall thoughts from H: Like I said above, I was not impressed which is unfortunate, I was told it was quite good and I was looking forward to a great meal. The service was fast and the ambiance was much like a large restaurant. Lots of tables, lighting that could change depending on the time, and well, what you would normally see at every other type of restaurant set up for tourists.
We started off with the Oyster sampler that I was looking forward to. In fact it was not all that great. They did too much with the oyster and I could have been eating pretty much anything because the taste of the other ingredients overpowered everything. Oysters can be helped or hurt by doing just the right amount or way too much. In this case it was way too much. [C says, I didn’t think the oysters were bad, though I will say the breadcrumb-topped ones were probably the best. The others were cheesy--they were tasty, but H is right, the oysters were kind of overpowered in those two.]
The drinks were good, but normal. Nothing spectacular. The dinner that I choose was a oyster and pancetta pasta with a cream sauce. Which sounds amazing, but when it arrived, all I saw was a white dish in a white bowl. Where was my pancetta? Well in fact...there wasn’t any. Seriously, what the heck? I have seen more pancetta as decoration on a cheese plate at the supermarket than I had in my pasta. It was virtually non-existent. On top of that ,the oysters weren’t that great and one was even overcooked.
Look, if you are going to be a restaurant in New Orleans and serve oysters, you better damn well have some good oyster dishes, but what I had could have had any other type of mollusk. This should never happen, period. Was not happy, will not go back. Trust me, stay away. Go somewhere else, not worth the $3 parking fee.
C says, I agree with H that there are much better places, but the food was not bad. I commented on the oysters above. I had the seafood stew. I should have gotten the small plate; the entree is literally a pot full of stew--they bring it out in the pot! It could definitely serve at least two. The broth was good, and there was plenty of seafood, including fish, shrimp, oysters, and mussels. The rice was underseasoned, though, which threw off the balance of the dish, and the veggies they included were kind of a strange combo with the seafood (green beans, squash, etc), but they seemed to be fresh. Also, a pet peeve of mine is leaving the tails on shrimp in a dish like this. It’s unnecessary, unless the goal is to make me get my hands dirty. Our other dining companions had the crabcake--which looked great--and the chili-butter fish (swordfish), and they both seemed happy. For dessert, we tried the white chocolate bread pudding, which was okay, but nothing special, and the chocolate truffle flourless cake, which was also not bad, but I doubt it was made in house.
So, this is really a place for tourists and convention attendees. You could do worse, but you could also do so much better.
