Thursday, August 23, 2012

New Orleans Hamburger & Seafood Co.


New Orleans, Louisiana

Burgers and seafood? Yeah sure, why not?

I had a friend craving some white beans and rice when she rolled into town, and this was the spot she mentioned. New Orleans Hamburger & Seafood Co., an establishment with nine locations around the New Orleans area. We dined in at  the St. Charles location, which is a block down and across the street from Superior Seafood.



Well, I'll go ahead and get into the meal. We started off by ordering the Oysters Saint Rock. It's a fried oyster served in a half shell on top of creamed spinach, pepperjack cheese and a Tabasco hollandaise. Not the conventional way to serve oysters, but I must say that it was pretty damn good. The creamed spinach was maybe a little bit on the dry side but the Tabasco hollandaise made it out to be pretty nice.



Considering that this place has the word "hamburger" in their name, I figured that I couldn't really go wrong by ordering one. I went with The Grand Parade. It comes with apple smoked bacon, bleu cheese, red onion and bbq sauce. Every burger also comes with their garlic herb fries.




First, I tried one of their fries. Just based on it's physical appearance and the smell, I figured they'd be ridiculously good. Unfortunately, this garlic butter and herb dressing they put on it was a little over the top. The flavor was good, but made the fries unbelievably heavy. There was actually so much of it that it made some of the fries on the bottom rather soggy, and also crept onto my hamburger bun. So heavy that I couldn't finish them all.

The hamburger on appearance again looked pretty tasty. The bun by itself made it look pretty delicious. The actual hamburger patty didn't hold much flavor at all, poorly seasoned. The toppings were pretty much the only thing saving this guy. The bacon was cooked well though. Pretty disappointed,  I would have to say.

What they seem to pride themselves on is their thin cut catfish, which comes along with the order of white beans and rice.


I tried my friend's white beans and rice first and it was loaded with a smoky flavor. I found it to be pretty appetizing, but if you're not partial to smoky flavors, I'd probably stay away from it. The thin cut catfish on the other hand was delicious! The batter made it very crispy and it was seasoned pretty well. I could probably eat a few plates of it by itself.

One pleasant surprise is the unlimited soft serve ice cream cones you can get! Our waitress told us about it at the end of our meal. The waitstaff was friendly, and the environment was pretty much like a normal sports bar. Overall, my experience here was fairly average.

New Orleans Hamburger & Seafood Co. - 4141 St. Charles Avenue, New Orleans, Louisiana
http://www.nohsc.com/home/uptown/

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Thursday, August 9, 2012

Louie's Cafe


Baton Rouge, Louisiana

You think "open 24 hours a day," and probably think of Waffle House and IHOP. If you're around the north gates of the LSU campus, save yourself the trouble of deciding on the two commercial places and hit up Louie's Cafe! Known for their awesome hashbrowns and hamburgers, this place has been serving up hangover cures and breakfast feasts to Baton Rougians and LSU students since 1941. One of the best things about this place is that you can order anything on their menu at any time of the day. A perfect place to get your "brinner"(breakfast at dinner time) on.


I decided to get Combo  #3, which comes with a waffle or pancakes, two eggs cooked any way, and your choice of bacon, links, patty or ham. I'm always a waffle man, but unfortunately their waffle iron was broken that night, so I had to settle for pancakes. I chose the bacon and ordered my eggs over easy. Everything is delicious. You can't really go wrong with this combo, the only thing missing was an order of their delicious hashbrowns.



My friend and I decided to split an order of their Pepper Jack Hashbrowns. It's Louie's hashbrowns, that always comes cooked with onions and other spices, but topped with jalapenos and melted pepper jack cheese. These are my favorite because I enjoy the heat, but you can get them in tons of different ways (chili/cheese, sausage/cheese, or with mushrooms, colby and sour cream).


This place can fix any hunger need at any time of the day, what else more could you ask for? Only downer is that their delicious biscuits are only served from 6AM-11AM.

Other than that, swing by, grab a seat on the old school stools and enjoy some history.

Louie's Cafe - 206 West State Street, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
http://www.louiescafe.org/

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Sunday, August 5, 2012

Fat Hen Grocery

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New Orleans, Louisiana
It's breakfast time on St. Charles and I was pleasantly introduced to Fat Hen Grocery. Immediately after parking my car across the street car tracks, I catch the aroma of cooked bacon in the air. If anyone is a fan of bacon... which many of us are, you'll probably enjoy their food.

I started off with a glass of their fresh squeezed orange juice and the recommended appetizer of the Billionaire's Bacon. Thick cut bacon drizzled with praline sauce. Well in my case it was covered, not drizzled but still AMAZING. If you're a fan of candied bacon, this is to die for. The combination of sweet and salty and the pecan garnish creates a great flavor. It's also probably the thickest cut of bacon I've ever consumed so they don't cheapen it there.



Here is their Breakfast Fried Rice, it comes with 2 eggs any style, jasmine rice, ham, mushrooms, English peas, topped with green onions and sesame seeds. I knew that it would be a play on just normal fried rice, but surprisingly found it with more Oriental style than I expected. It was okay, I caught a lot of ginger seasoning in it which pretty much overpowered the flavor of everything else for me.





This is an order of one of their pancakes. One single pancake turns out to be the size of a tire and about 3/4 of an inch thick. We asked to cook it with bacon inside, we caught an awkward look from our waitress but she came through and they actually did it.



One item that caught my mind was the Duck Hash & Eggs. It comes with 2 eggs sunny side up on top of hash browns with ShaneMade duck bacon, asparagus, roasted tomatoes, truffle vinaigrette, and your choice of either toast or one of their homemade biscuits. I had no idea what they meant by duck bacon, but any kind of bacon is good with me. It turned out to be slices of duck with a trim of fat on top, making it appear to look like bacon, quite delicious if you ask me. They certainly know how to cook eggs and the pairing of ingredients were pretty nice. I would have liked a little more crispiness to my potatoes though.




The homemade biscuit was really good too, they serve them with their homemade spread as well. Overall I had an enjoyable experience here. The atmosphere is pretty unique, they have stool seating on a bar, tables, and booths on the side. They catch a lot of flack for terrible service but we had a really good waitress. It was early in the day though and not very busy. This place did eventually get slammed as we were finishing. Another good thing is that they allow you to bring your own bottles of champagne. With their fresh squeezed orange juice, it made for some awesome mimosas.

Fat Hen Grocery - 7457 Saint Charles Avenue, New Orleans, Louisiana
http://fathengrill.com/

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