For Lunch Today

For Lunch Today was one of the most popular series on Blackened Out way back in the day when we only had 4 readers instead of our current 5. (Thanks, mom.) And then one day, like so many critically acclaimed series which came before it - Bromance, The Playboy Club, and Man Up, to name a few - For Lunch Today just up and disappeared. never to be heard of again...

Until now... at least for today... maybe this just one time... we'll see how it goes.

In the days before the Saints playoff game against the Lions and the BCS Championship game (I apologize for opening old wounds), the newest addition to John Besh's empire quietly opened in the bottom of the Hyatt Hotel. Now the secret is out, as evidenced by my attempt to secure reservations this past Saturday night, when the only tables available were at 5:30 or 10:00. Despite my recent rejection, I have been able to snag a table at Borgne on 4 previous occasions, and I will write more about those in a longer review sometime in the next few weeks. But today's post is about lunch, and all that you need is two words: rabbit ragout.

Borgne offers a $10 daily lunch special on every day of the week. I have tasted a few and have been mostly pleased. But the hands down, best daily special available - perhaps the best dish on the entire menu - is the Wednesday special of rabbit ragout. Either I or someone at my table has ordered it on multiple opportunities, and each time the dish had me lapping up the bowl. Kind of awkward when it was not my bowl to begin with, but hey it happens.

The foundation of the dish is a reduced stock (a combination of pork/shrimp or chicken/shrimp, I can't remember) which provides immense flavor. So often I find myself fishing out the substance of a dish like this and leaving behind a sad and empty pool of tepid broth. Nothing could be further from the truth in this case. The main components are chunks of ground rabbit sausage and tender orecchiette pasta. The composed dish has sort of an Italian/Cajun thing going with the anise from the ground rabbit sausage, the sweetness from cherry tomatoes, and bitterness from strands of broccoli rabe. The plate is finished with a few sprigs of fresh herbs and slivers of parm which bring a nice nutty component. This dish has the whole package.

Do yourself a favor. Resolve to starve yourself tomorrow by skipping lunch and saving the $5 that would have gone toward your footlong lunch. Take that $5 and the other $5 which is earmarked for lunch today, go to Borgne, and order the rabbit ragout. You can post your thank you's in the comments this afternoon.

Lunch at MiLa

Ah, lunch. Once our favorite time of the school day, lunch now often consists of an ever-shortening window of time during which we wolf down a $5 footlong in between meetings, phone calls, and TPS reports. The need for speed is one of the many blessings of the work place, and sometimes we are lucky enough to snag a bag of peanuts from the vending machine to hold off starvation before heading home.

But there is lunch, and then there is lunch. The kind of meal where you transport yourself, if only for 60 minutes, to a place where the rest of the world takes a break from the daily hustle and bustle to allow you to enjoy real food, maybe a glass of wine, and some non-work related conversation before getting back to the grind.


At MiLa, such an experience will only run you $20.

Meals at MiLa still begin with the a basket filled with rolls and thin wedges of firm corn bread presented with miniature cast iron skillets of lima bean puree and cold salted butter. Venison pâté, rustic in appearance but elegant in flavor, is served with creole mustard, thinly sliced cornichon and buttery slices of toasted baguette. $10 well spent to supplement the prix fixe.

Soup or salad begins the prix fix. The novelty of butternut squash soup may have long since passed, but the familiarity of the dish does not detract from the worthiness of MiLa's version, which is enriched with spiced crème fraiche and served with crispy shitake chips and lumps of crabmeat bobbing up and down upon the surface. The salad is a simple composition of organic greens, salty Louisiana feta, sunflower seeds for crunch, and a bright lemon vinaigrette.

On to the main events. I ordered the phyllo crusted redfish on my first visit to MiLa, and three years later here it is still, with the thatched roof of phyllo dough providing a nice crunch to the moist fillet underneath. Israeli couscous, wilted and slightly bitter greens, and a sauce of thickened lobster stock rounds out the dish. For the carnivores, braised veal cheeks (which we have seen on a lot of menus lately) atop a puree of fingerling potatoes.

Dessert is a choice between simple pleasures. The omnipresent vanilla bean rice pudding topped with glazed seasonal berries, blue ones in this case, is a dish whose humble connotation as peasant food is wiped away with just one spoonful. It's just plain good. Or maybe a bowl of housemade ice cream - banana on the most recent visit - topped with crunchy almond streusel.

For those who enjoy a glass of wine with their lunch (only on Fridays, of course), the list at MiLa offers a number of bottles in the $30 range. Service, once the Achilles heel of the restaurant, has markedly improved in terms of both polish and speed. On this most recent visit, the lunch hour need only be extended by a few minutes in order to enjoy a 3 course meal from one of the city's most underrated and often forgotten about restaurants.

Lunch at MiLa - Eagle
$20 for 3 Courses
Mon-Fri 11:30am-2:30pm
817 Common Street at the Pere Marquette Hotel
(504) 412-2580

Lunch Today, Wednesday March 27th

Get on Interstate headed towards the airport. Get off at N. Carrollton. Take North Carrollton to Bienville and turn right on Bienville. Stop at Liuzza's. If you gave up drinking during office hours for Lent, this would be a good time to pick up the habit again. Liuzza's serves beer ice-cold in frosted schooner mugs. Start with one of those.

You would do yourself a disservice if you did not order either the fried pickles or fried onion rings for an appetizer. The pickles are great but the show stopper is the fried onion rings. Home-made with a thin flaky exterior these onion rings are best with a little salt and a mixture of 50% ketchup and 50% hot sauce.

Prior to Katrina, the only thing I had ever ordered from Liuzza's was the Roast Beef Po-Boy, dressed. Following the glorious re-opening of Liuzza's they were unable to make Roast Beef for a long while. Since everyone had to sacrifice something following the storm, I began eating the Panee Chicken Po-Boy. That sandwich is so good, when the roast beef returned for a while I would go half Roast Beef and Half Panee Chicken. Finally in a Eureka moment the two were combined (WARNING: IF YOU GET NAUSEOUS EASILY, LOOK AWAY). When you go today ask them to bring you a Panee Chicken Po-Boy topped with roast beef and gravy, dressed of course. If that last sentence made you recoil in horror,, I apologize; if however, it made you go that sounds awesome, welcome to the Fat Kid Special.

Other great meals there include any of their fried seafood, plate lunches, or Italian specialities. Also, they have an original po-boy (French Fries, gravy, mayo, and cheese) and delicious fried green tomatoes with a tangy remoulade. The only drawback is that Liuzza's only takes cash. However, there is an ATM in the jernt. Which is really what Liuzza's is a perfect model of, the neighborhood jernt.