Does Turbo Squid, Jeriko House, NOLA 180, Alldaybuffet.org or the New Orleans Exchange mean anything to you?

You can find out if they should on startupneworleans.com, a website that profiles the above intriguing named companies and other smart people doing extremely interesting things in New Orleans.

The site describes NOLA and the previewed businesses as: Read the rest of this entry »

I think people who grew up eating muffulettas tend to think of them as, well, muffulettas – a sandwich unto itself, a given in the local catalogue of good food. Others who discover the sandwich later in life after forming all kinds of food associations – like myself – sometimes tend to define the muffuletta by what it resembles. I remember one early attempt going something like this: “It’s like an Italian grinder on better bread. And, um, with lots of olives and olive oil. And, ah, yeah, no lettuce or tomato.”

Recently, I’ve heard the more erudite description of the muffuletta as antipasti on a sandwich, which seems like an especially apt comparison for the specimen prepared at Just Italy, the Metairie deli I reviewed this week.

That’s because owner John Bellini takes a purist’s approach to both his muffuletta and his antipasti platters. Both are assembled from a truly well stocked deli case and both are several levels of ambition higher than the familiar standard. Read the rest of this entry »

Enthusiastic New Orleanians cheered today at the news that retired head of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will receive an engineering award. Retired Lt. Gen. Carl Strock was in charge of the Corps when Hurricane Katrina struck the city, and he is being recognized by the American Society of Civil Engineers for “improving quality of life worldwide.” Wilma Johnson, a former Gentilly resident now living in Dallas, said she couldn’t be happier for Strock.

“Next to President Bush, I can’t think of anyone who deserves more applause for his actions when Katrina caused the water to jump over the levees,” Johnson said. “Sure, I spent a week up on my roof, but I knew that somewhere in Washington D.C., General Strock was thinking about me.”

Strock’s courageous actions didn’t end with the draining of New Orleans. Before retiring from the Army a little less than a year following Hurricane Katrina , the lieutenant general bravely assigned the Corps to investigate itself for the levee failures. Read the rest of this entry »