Tale of Two Restaurants
We ate at Emeril's New Orleans Fish House for lunch today, and I have to say it was not bad, but remarkably different from the dinner menu. I guess I shouldn't complain, they didn't have a lunch menu the first few years we started going there. If you didn't secure a reservation two weeks in advance, you had less chance of getting a table as Robert Blake would be trying to get a seat at Rao's.
I had the littleneck clams and gumbo for an appetizer, crabcakes for entree. I know, why buy crabcakes when I derided them in an earlier post. I was curious. Nayan had the lobster bisque and a shimp remuloude salad. The clams were fresh and briny, but a bit hard to scrape out of the shell. The bisque was sweet and creamy with a solid weight that coated my tongue, allowing absorption of a great amount of flavor. It was spectacular, and I'm comparing it to the crab bisque at the Tommy Bahama Cafe in Maui, which was the best bowl I've had ever. More on that in another post. My gumbo was...dark and tasteless. For a celebrity chef known for bold flavors and not being afraid of overdosing his dishes with one particular ingredient or another, they were certainly frightened of salting it too much. It also had the color of black beans, which is almost purplish, which is not what a gumbo should look like. Well, that's my own conceit, everyone is free to make it anyway the please. Since I'm paying, however, I'll call the shots on this one. I needed Lot's wife to salt this stuff. The shrimp were the meak salad shrimp you thaw out that are nearly microscopic and waterlogged. They certainly didn't add any flavor to the gumbo.
My crabcakes weren't all that bad. Not huge by any measure, but the waitress told me they wouldn't be. They also didn't try to pass them off with euphamisms like "East Coast" or "Maryland" crab cakes. They were a different recipe, 100% crab, with a bread crumb crust. They were perfectly browned on the outside, and flavorful through and through. My only criticism was there wasn't enough remoulade on the plate. So, the artistic swirls were nice to look at, but ran out on my first crabcake. Not a huge deal, the cakes had enough flavor to carry the dish.
Nayan's salad was hearty and different. Can't say it was my favorite salad - I'm not a big salad eater to begin with - but the greens/dressing mixed well with the remoulade coated shrimp. Sometimes restaurants miss the mark by throwing two completely incompatible foods together (some kind of protein haphazardly spiked onto a plate of mesculin). This was thoughtful and complimentary and was quite enjoyable.
We didn't stay long, since this was more of a snack for us, but the crowd was loose and friendly. Hey, it's Vegas, so you are going to have a lively bunch having a good time, and sometimes, that makes the experience more than the food.
I had the littleneck clams and gumbo for an appetizer, crabcakes for entree. I know, why buy crabcakes when I derided them in an earlier post. I was curious. Nayan had the lobster bisque and a shimp remuloude salad. The clams were fresh and briny, but a bit hard to scrape out of the shell. The bisque was sweet and creamy with a solid weight that coated my tongue, allowing absorption of a great amount of flavor. It was spectacular, and I'm comparing it to the crab bisque at the Tommy Bahama Cafe in Maui, which was the best bowl I've had ever. More on that in another post. My gumbo was...dark and tasteless. For a celebrity chef known for bold flavors and not being afraid of overdosing his dishes with one particular ingredient or another, they were certainly frightened of salting it too much. It also had the color of black beans, which is almost purplish, which is not what a gumbo should look like. Well, that's my own conceit, everyone is free to make it anyway the please. Since I'm paying, however, I'll call the shots on this one. I needed Lot's wife to salt this stuff. The shrimp were the meak salad shrimp you thaw out that are nearly microscopic and waterlogged. They certainly didn't add any flavor to the gumbo.
My crabcakes weren't all that bad. Not huge by any measure, but the waitress told me they wouldn't be. They also didn't try to pass them off with euphamisms like "East Coast" or "Maryland" crab cakes. They were a different recipe, 100% crab, with a bread crumb crust. They were perfectly browned on the outside, and flavorful through and through. My only criticism was there wasn't enough remoulade on the plate. So, the artistic swirls were nice to look at, but ran out on my first crabcake. Not a huge deal, the cakes had enough flavor to carry the dish.
Nayan's salad was hearty and different. Can't say it was my favorite salad - I'm not a big salad eater to begin with - but the greens/dressing mixed well with the remoulade coated shrimp. Sometimes restaurants miss the mark by throwing two completely incompatible foods together (some kind of protein haphazardly spiked onto a plate of mesculin). This was thoughtful and complimentary and was quite enjoyable.
We didn't stay long, since this was more of a snack for us, but the crowd was loose and friendly. Hey, it's Vegas, so you are going to have a lively bunch having a good time, and sometimes, that makes the experience more than the food.
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