Best Of New Orleans Blog

Vintage
4536 Magazine Street (upstairs)
Thursdays 6 p.m. - midnight

Friday classes optional. It was a kind of unwritten rule many of us lived by, back in my days as a happy little co-ed at LSU. Thursday was the big night to go out. Fraternity mixers, drink specials and live music at the bars, etc.

But out here in the real world — inasmuch as New Orleans can be considered the real world — Fridays are mandatory. Or maybe that doesn’t apply to everyone, because lately I’ve noticed that wherever I go, Thursday nights are happening. Restaurants are packed; bars are hopping. People are out. .

However, it takes more than a hip crowd, a hot meal or a drink special to get me out on a school night these days. Still, for the past two Thursdays, I’ve been bellying up to a new bar in town, one that is exclusively a Thursday night thing. It’s called Vintage (4523 Magazine St.), the beautiful, newly renovated space above Savvy Gourmet. (more…)

Last night, we attended a Spring Mountain wine dinner at Dominique’s at the Maison Dupuy which is hosting a series of dinners for the French Quarter Wine Festival. The wines were marvelous and well-paired with Chef Dominique’s sublime cuisine. Winemaker Jac Cole was here for the event and it was enlightening to hear him not only discuss Spring Mountain wines, but the Spring Mountain AVA (American Viticultural Area) and mountain fruit in general. Spring Mountain, which is home to Pride, Cain Five, Keenan, and a host of other premier wineries, sort of flies under the radar, or clouds, and doesn’t seem as well known to wine lovers as other Napa mountains such as Howell, Diamond Mountain, Mount Veeder, etc. Last night again proved what terrific, concentrated wines are produced on Spring Mountain, and especially by the area’s namesake winery. I will be featuring Spring Mountain Cabernet as a Wine of the Week in a forthcoming column.

(Scroll down the blog a piece for ‘Bourbon Street pt.1: The Big Game’)

Following my first real shift bartending on Bourbon Street, I got canned.

Over the weekend, my new boss had rushed me through three, three-hour training sessions (pay: $20 a shift, no tips) to ready me for the surely-lucrative Ohio State vs LSU game on Monday. At the end of those long short-shifts filling beer bongs for crosseyed-drunk Ohio State meatheads — then waiting for hours into the night for my managers to cut me checks for $20 for gas money tomorrow — I then declared to my new boss, “I am ready to make some money Monday!”

“No way man,” my amnesiac boss responded. “I got bartenders been working here all year waiting for this shift. You gotta stick around here a while and earn the good shifts.”

Crappy. But not strange. Who can you really trust on Bourbon Street? This particular bar is famous for Jaeger bombs, yet uses fake Jaeger in a green plastic bottle branded with a variation on the Jaeger logo. But because I wanted to bartend Bourbon through Mardi Gras — to save up and move away from New Orleans for a while — I flowed with their b.s. Let the bad times roll. (more…)

Seven years ago, after moving here from Florida, I spent some weeks working at a fine-dining restaurant on Bourbon Street. I watched the place’s white-table-cloth-and-piano-jazz mood killed over-and-over by the constant stream of stumbling Yankee pukers passing outside the picture window, until finally they turned it into a sports bar called The Frat House. I went on to work at better, or at least more tolerable restaurants and bars in other more realistic parts of this city, and even managed to escape the Service Industry entirely for several years. But now as I plan my escape from New Orleans (surely I’ll return; I just need a break; god do I need a break) I find myself again tending bar on Bourbon Street.

“You need to hurry and squeeze in your three, three-hour training shifts this weekend,” said my new boss, a big burly older dude who seems mellower and more understanding than most who’ve been in charge of me. “That way you can be ready to work the big Ohio State vs. LSU game Monday.” So badly in need am I, that wading into a crowd of drunk football fans sounds absolutely desirable. (more…)

Loved meeting the two extremely talented, philanthropic guys (Mat and Fleet) who started the Dog Lover’s Wine Club which has been gaining new members and fans in the New Orleans area for their lovely wines and for generously sharing the proceeds with the L.S.P.C.A. Had the distinct pleasure of pouring for them at their first Canine Culture event and found the wines as well as the attendees– including our 4-legged friends– most pleasant and approachable! So much so that Tim and I ordered a case of our favorite of the group offered, the Pinot Noir, with our little lion-headed poodle featured on the label. (more…)

After a fabulous New Year’s Eve feast at Galatoire’s….most of our group went on to other parties while we stayed in the Quarter to welcome the New Year. As we awaited the countdown to 2008 and ensuing fireworks, we decided to pop one of the two celebratory bottles we hauled up to our viewing spot atop a French Quarter building. We brought two 1995 (an excellent year!)Champagnes, a Perrier Jouet and Veuve Cliquot. Both were seriously cooked… no saving those babies… so the race was on to grab a cold, non-vintage Brut Champagne for the midnight toast! Tim dashed off and returned with a lovely “fresh” Mumm Cordon Rouge! Although I was hopeful the vintageChampagnes would still be in good order, because every pre-Katrina Champagne we’ve opened in the past two years — including several 1979 Heidsieck Monopole Magnums were fine, I knew our luck had to run out at some point! I wonder what other readers chose for their New Year’s Eve toasts…..

As the weather is expected to worsen in the next couple of days.. and most local New Orleanians are hoping a roof leak doesn’t expand, their pet is able to “hold it”, or that their street which is notorious for flooding doesn’t rise with water (I have never understood the “flash flooding term” used by meteorologist- it seems to me, that we have only had one recent notorious flash flooding incident, and normally the water here just seems to rise as the pumps get overwhelmed and sewers are clogged) (more…)