Wraps - Jackson

Location is a hugely important part of a successful business. There are always those loud, proud restaurants that dominate the scenery and everyone knows. However, how many times have you heard someone gush about a hole in the wall restaurant or one that was off the beaten path? Wraps definitely falls into the latter category. Located behind a Subway and nestled in Maywood Mart, most people could pass Wraps a thousand times and be none the wiser. It’s been a few years since I’ve eaten there, so I decided to stop back in.

Once inside, you can’t help but notice all the Greek kitsch on the walls. As nice as the touches of Greece are, I was more interested in the menu. There’s your standard gyro, but after that, Wraps seems to have every conceivable filling. There’s a pork tenderloin, tilapia, vegetable, chicken, flat iron steak, and shrimp, not to mention all the specialty gyros. With an equally large selection of salads, my only complaint with the menu was almost all the specialty gyros needed further explanation

I decided to get a baseline and ordered an authentic Greek gyro and a pita melt.

The pita melt and the gyro came at the same time, but with a combination of feta and mozzarella, I thought it best to eat the pita melt first.

The herbs inside the wrap were a nice touch as this was a deceptively simple, yet delicious appetizer.

That thick layer of mozzarella really conceals the feta and basil making each bite a nice surprise. The only downside to this dish is that it’s best hot and fresh; once it cools, it loses a fair amount of its charm.

Moving on to the main attraction, I turned towards my gyro.

You can’t help but notice those large chunks of salt on each fry.

In addition to selling gryos and salads, Wraps sells “authentic Greek sea salt.” I think this is their way of pitching the hard good and it’s a good sell. There’s nothing exceptional about the fries, they are just well salted and very well fried. That simplicity is more than captivating and it’s damn hard to resist.

Unwrapping the gyro, it has an inherently messy, but home styled appearance. Regardless, there was a rich, creamy tzatiki sauce that went perfectly with the tender lamb.

The chopped meat and sauce reminded me more of a cheese steak than a gyro, but I’m not complaining. It may come as a bit of a shock, but I’ll go out on a limb and say that Wraps has Keifer’s beat when it comes to gyros. Sure Keifer’s has a better location and a fine atmosphere, but the homemade and slightly messy approach to Wraps make it that much more charming and satisfying.

Even though the pita melt and gyro were more than filling, I couldn’t stop myself from trying the baklava. I was sure that like everything else, this house made dessert would be fantastic.

Each serving of baklava comes this way, wrapped in cling wrap.

It looks all very promising.

Unfortunately, the baklava is literally swimming in syrup and that delightful crunch of the phyllo dough is lost. While good syrup is often welcome, this time it muddles the flavor and texture of the entire dish.

Outside of the baklava, I enjoyed my lunch at Wraps so much that I got take out for lunch the next week. I decided to give two of the specialty gyros a try. First up was the souvlaki.

Yes, the messiness of the gyros was not lost during take out.

With all the extra sauce and a very thick pita, this gyro was incredibly difficult to eat. The lamb was also a little more scarce than I had hoped. However, what lamb was there was very well complimented by the huge chunks of feta and excellent sauce. While the souvlaki wasn’t everything I had hoped for, it was a very rewarding specialty gyro.

In addition to the souvlaki, I decided to try one of the locally named specialties, Yanni’s special.

To begin, I can’t accuse Wraps of shorting me on the lamb or chunks of chicken.

You can see underneath the meat, there is a layer of toasted mozzarella. Like all of their gyros, the Yanni’s special was incredibly difficult to eat without ruining your shirt. However, once you take a bite of that tender lamb, moist chicken and delicious tzatiki sauce, all faults are forgiven.

I know it’s a foregone conclusion; Wraps will never replace Keifer’s as the place in Jackson to get gyros. However, if people would take the time to look in Maywood Mart, behind that Subway, they would find a small Greek restaurant with a charming interior, a welcoming owner, and a damn fine gyro. I only recommend that you bring a steady hand or a bib.

Cooking the Book - Charcuterie - Corned Beef

With the eggplant being less than spectacular, but the banana peppers top notch, I decided to move onto my first meat recipe from Michael Ruhlman & Brian Polcyn’s “Charcuterie”. As much as I wanted to delve headfirst into the world of cold smoked meats and sausages, I decided to start relatively small with a corned beef.

I’ve been meaning to try out their corned beef recipe for quite some time, but there was one hurdle, sodium nitrate or salt peter. I had originally planned to try Alton Brown’s recipe, but I couldn’t find salt peter anywhere in Jackson. Ruhlman & Polcyn’s recipe actually called for pink salt, and they were kind enough to list suppliers in the back of their book. After ordering some instacure #1 & #2 from the Sausage Maker in Buffalo, I was finally ready to make my own corned beef.

Like everything in their “Recipes for Salt-Cured Food” section, this recipe starts with a large helping of salt.

450 grams of kosher salt and 1 gallon (4 liters) of water were the base.

Next came 25 grams of pink salt or instacure #1, and it really is that shockingly pink.

In a large pot, the gallon of water, 450 gram of kosher salt, and 25 grams of pink salt were combined with 100 grams of sugar, 3 minced cloves of garlic, and 20 grams of pickling spice.

It was all brought to a simmer and then cooled to room temperature and then refrigerated.

The recipe actually calls for the 5 pound brisket to be brined in the pot. I decided to stray from that idea.

Another fine cut of meat from Paul Anthony’s.

It may look a little odd, but it works.

Everything looks covered with brine.

However, a plate on top is cheap security. Everything went in the fridge for 5 days.

Five days later, I was ready to see how things looked.

It doesn’t look too good at this stage.

Once the brisket was out in the open, you can really tell how much the brine has changed the color of the brisket.

Although I was a little worried about that blatantly red streak.

The brisket was rinsed under cool water and I was ready to move forward.

As soon as I figured out which pot would comfortably hold the brisket, I put it inside and then added enough water to cover.

Next came the last ingredient.

20 grams of pickling spice

With the pickling spice in the pot, I brought everything to a boil, reduced the heat and simmered it for 3 or so hours. I think I actually pulled the brisket out after 2 ½ hours. At that point, it was perfectly fork tender.

Now that the cooking was done, I took a step back to look at my work>

Even without the flash, you can tell that the corned beef has that wonderful pink color.

With the flash, it’s only that much pinker.

Sure, I could use a large knife to carve this brisket, but this was the perfect time to use my meat slicer.

It took a minute to set everything right.

I guessed that 6 would be the right setting.

After I started slicing, I realized this would be messy as hell, but look at the beautiful corned beef.

In the end, it was a little depressing that all that time had made a pile that small. However, once I tasted that hot corned beef, I knew it was completely worth it.

So, I’ve had mixed results with Ruhlman & Polcyn’s vegetable recipes, but grand success with my first try at one of their meat recipes. Seeing as the book is named charcuterie, I have that meat is more of their forte. I have a feeling I’ll be revisiting this book a number of times, especially with cooler weather outside.

Cooking the Book – Charcuterie – Pickling Spice, Pickled Eggplant, & Pickled Banana Peppers

Charcuterie, to me, the very word conjures up images of sopressatas, salamis, lonzino, lonza, coppa and a bounty of other cured meats. So, needless to say, when I read about the “Charcuterie – The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing” by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn, I knew I had to have it.

It doesn’t take long before you realize this is a bible for meat lovers. However, under the section “Recipes for Salt-Cured Foods”, there is a fair amount of writing on pickled vegetables. Always looking for way to preserve my garden’s bounty, I decided to give a few of their recipes a whirl.

The first thing I would need is pickling spice. There were a fair number of ingredients to Ruhlman & Polcyn’s recipe, but it started with black peppercorns, mustard seeds, and coriander seeds.

First, I lightly toasted 20 grams of each spice in a dry pan.

Then I did my best to smash them with the side of a knife. The idea is to crack them open, but all it seemed to do was make a mess.

The cracked spices were added to a bowl with 12 grams of red pepper flakes, 14 grams of allspice berries, 8 grams of ground mace, 2 small cinnamon sticks (broken into small pieces), 6 grams of whole cloves, and 8 grams of ground ginger.

Last but not least were 24 crumbled bay leaves. With my pickling spice ready, it was time to move on to the vegetables.

Ruhlman and Polcyn are very emphatic about the right ratio of salt to water for pickling. Their golden number is a 5 % solution.

Here I’ve combined the 50 grams of kosher salt and 1 liter of water in a pot. The recipe calls for “optional, but recommended seasonings” such as garlic, ginger, chilies, peppercorns, thyme, tarragon, or pickling spice.

This is all well and good, but there is no specified amount. I reasoned that since there were 50 grams of kosher salt, why not 50 grams of pickling spice.

After coming to a simmer, I let it cool to room temperature. This gave me plenty of time to prep my vegetables to be pickled.

I know that October is a little late for eggplants, but there were a few stragglers and I decided to try them in this recipe.

That’s a quart jar full of slice and peeled eggplant.

Once the vegetables were covered, the recipes calls for one of two methods to keep the vegetables covered. I opted for the plastic wrap method.

A little brine on top, just to make sure everything was covered.

From here, the jar went into a cool spot, the pantry, for 7 days.

The idea is to keep the jar below 75 degrees. A constant sub 75 degrees is hard to achieve in the south, but this is the best I can do without using the fridge.

A week later it was time to taste the vegetables.

The saran wrap and brine combo worked perfectly.

Ruhlman and Polcyn write the vegetables “should retain their crunch and have a mild salty-sour taste”. If I wanted a stronger flavor I could have recovered them and let sit for 3 more days.

I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect with eggplants, and while they weren’t as crunch as I expected, the pickling spice had imparted a great, oddly sweet flavor.

The eggplant seemed good to me, so I moved on to the next step.

First the eggplants were drained and set aside.

Next the brine was strained and brought to a boil. After killing the bacteria, the brine was left to cool.

Once cooled, the brine was poured over the eggplant, covered and refrigerated. According to the recipe, these eggplants will now keep indefinitely in the fridge. I’m doubtful of this claim, but I really don’t want to try and test it.

Having a fair of brine left over, I decided to pickle some banana peppers as well.

Here are my two jars of pickles a week or so later.

The pickled eggplant looks much the same.

However, these gorgeous banana peppers took to the brine beautifully. While the eggplant had been a little lackluster, the flavor of the peppers had been wonderfully complimented by the brine. So, Ruhlman and Polcyn aren’t off to a bad start with “Charcuterie”.

Cooking the Web - Homemade Candy Corn

It’s no secret; I’ve never been a fan of candy corn. To me, it’s an odd tasting candy that only gets stuck to your teeth. However, when I read about Cakespy’s recipe for homemade candy corn on Serious eats

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2009/10/how-to-make-homemade-candy-corn-halloween-recipe.html

I thought a homemade version of the Halloween classic might make turn me on to candy corn.

With only 7 ingredients, including the food coloring, this didn’t seem like a challenging recipe. Unfortunately, it wasn’t until I started that I noticed Cakespy didn’t give any temperatures in the recipe. I should have known that making candy without temperatures is a surefire ticket to disaster, but I persevered.

To begin, 2/3 cup of light corn syrup, 1/3 cup salted butter, and 1 cup granulated suger were added to a sauce pan.

From there, everything was brought to a boil

Here is where this recipe goes awry. Once the mixture has reached a boil, Cakespy calls for the heat to be turned to medium and stirred for five minutes.

After the five minutes was up, the 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract was added.

This doesn’t look right at all.

Now it’s time for the rest of the sugar.

2 ½ cups of sifted confectioner’s sugar and 1/3 cup of powdered milk were added to the wet ingredients.

The wet ingredients wouldn’t absorb a thing. I thought maybe the wet ingredients had cooled down too much.

I tried putting everything on very low heat.

Slowly, everything started to mix.

After a lot of stirring, I get an oddly colored pan full of sugar.

The next step calls for the dough to cool and then be separated into three equal amounts. However, that was not to be the case.

30 minutes later, when I came back, I had a rock solid mass of sugar. My best guess is that during that five minutes of cooking on medium, the sugar had rocketed past the hard crack stage and gone solid as a rock.

Not to be a quitter, I looked back at the recipe and scrolled down to the comments. It was more than happy to see someone had posted another recipe from the Washington Post.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/mighty-appetite/2007/10/getting_handy_with_candy_corn.html

This one came with temperatures, and the ingredients were practically identical. The only major difference was using salt and butter instead of salted butter.

Like before the sugar, corn syrup, and butter were added to the pan. I preferred how this recipe called for the vanilla to be added here. There wasn’t any of that annoying spatter that comes from adding vanilla to boiling sugar.

Once everything is brought a boil

The heat is reduced from high to medium-high and cooked for five minutes or until it reaches 225-230 on a candy thermometer.

With actual temperatures to work with, it was less than 3 minutes before my sugar hit 225. It’s no wonder my first batch turned into a rock.

Now the wet ingredients would absorb the mixture of confectioner’s sugar, powdered milk and salt.

After several minutes of wrist breaking stirring, I had something that actually looked like the white part of candy corn.

After everything had a chance to cool, I peeled it out of the pan and separated it into three portions.

It was now time for food coloring.

Thankfully the Washington Post also recommended mixing each portion inside a ziplock bag. No orange hands for me this time.

With a fair amount of kneading, I had something I could work with.

This is where it started to get ridiculous, but in a good way.

I didn’t have enough counter space to roll out all my ropes of candy corn.

After sticking the ropes together and flatting with a rolling pin, the ropes seemed to hold as one.

It was quick work with a knife and I had candy corn.

Yes, I know it doesn’t look like normal candy corn, especially since I got the color order wrong. What I was going for was taste and this blew the store bought version out of the water. There was the delightful combination of sugar and vanilla in every bite. It might take a few tries and little work, but the next time someone turns down candy corn, I’ll introduce them to some of the homemade variety.

Cooking the Book – Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook – Beef with Cumin (zi ran niu rou)

It seems that Sunday has become the de facto day for me to try out new recipes. Not knowing what I was in the mood for, I took a look at my ever growing collection of cookbooks. Almost by instinct, I went for a Fuschia Dunlop book. This time it was her “Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook”. Trying to find a way to use all of the beef from the Flying M Farm, I turned the pages to look at the short beef section. Knowing what ingredients I had in the kitchen, I knew only one dish would do: beef with cumin or zi ran niu rou

Once I dug a sirloin steak out of the freezer, I knew I would have more than the 12 ounces of beef that Dunlops’ recipe called for.

Conveniently, after slicing the sirloin into thin slices, I was sitting damn near 24 ounces of trimmed meat. This meant I could easily double the recipe without any foreseeable repercussions. Of course, I did my best to achieve Dunlop’s pedantic instructions. It’s hard to slice beef into exactly 1 ½ by 1 ¼ inch pieces.

Next it was time to make the marinade.

Added to the bowl was 2 tbsp of shaoxing wine, 1 tsp of salt, 2 tsp of light soy sauce, 2 tsp of dark soy sauce, 2 tbsp potato flour, and 2 tbsp water. Incidentally, I didn’t have any potato flour, but after some deliberation, I used potato starch. I didn’t see any adverse effects.

All of the beef was added to the bowl, making sure to mix well.

With the beef marinating, I got the rest of the ingredients together.

4 tsp of finely chopped ginger, 2 tbsp finely chopped garlic, 4 fresh chilies, finely chopped, 8 tsp of chili flakes, and 4 tsp of ground cumin were all tossed together in another bowl.

Since the ingredients would all be added at the same time, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to mix them now. Also, I figured it was worth the time to grind the cumin seeds, especially since it was in the name of the dish.

Now it was time to start the cooking. First I added about 2 cups of peanut oil to my wok, heated it to 275 and added the beef.

The idea is to only cook the beef until the pieces have separated. As soon as they did, I removed them from the wok, drained the oil and set them off to the side.

Leaving just 3 tablespoons of oil, the flame was kicked to high and the other bowl of ingredients was added.

I love it when a recipe says stir fry until fragrant, it’s so deliciously vague. Anyway, once the mixture was really pungent, I reintroduced the beef.

A little salt to taste and I was good to go.

The last fresh ingredients were 4 scallions (green parts only) that had been finely sliced.

You’ll have to look on the top right of the picture to see them. However, now that everything has been added, the whole lot was tossed together and ready to serve.

One last thing, you need 2 tsps of sesame oil stirred in at the last minute.

Here you can see the beef with cumin in all its glory.

Not that attractive is it?

Still, everything looks better over rice. Regardless, what’s important is the taste, and I’ll admit it took me a minute or two to warm up to this dish. I’m not used to so much cumin in Chinese cuisine. However, this is a Hunan cookbook. I’m more accustomed to a Sichuan style of cooking. Once I got over the cumin mental hurdle, I became a real fan of this dish. The full beef flavor is really complimented by the cumin and I love all the extra spice to the dish. However, my favorite thing about this dish is how easy it is to make and how many of the ingredients I always have on hand. This really could be a go to recipe for when I need a quick, easy, and delicious meal.

Cooking the Book – Bones – Lamb Roasted over Potatoes

I have a daunting task in front of me. In my garage freezer is two lamb’s worth of lamb meat. Personally, I love the stuff, but it’s incredibly hard to find recipes for ground lamb. Sure you have the odd kebab or burger recipe or that great stuffed zucchini recipe off Food & Wine.com. Nevertheless, as hard as it is to find something for ground lamb, finding a recipe for lamb shoulder seems like the quest for the Holy Grail. Thankfully, Jennifer McLagan has come to my rescue with her book “Bones – Recipes, History, & Lore”. Inside this masterpiece is a recipe for lamb roasted over potatoes, but not just any cut of lamb. This recipe gives the option of lamb shoulder or leg of lamb, but that’s enough talk, let’s get to work.

First things first, let’s see what sort of meat we have to work with.

I’ll be honest, I’ve never really seen a lamb shoulder. I’m not even sure what the cut is supposed to look like.

Complaining about lack of experience won’t do me any good, so I starts by trimming any excess fat.

With the extra fat in the garbage, I used a paring knife and made a number of ½ deep slits throughout the shoulder.

Then, I added a sliver of garlic into each slit.

Next, the lamb was drizzled with 1 tablespoon of olive oil.

After the oil, I sprinkled the lamb with 2 teaspoons of dried oregano. McLagan emphasis the use of Greek oregano; I’m sure it’s great, but I just used the McCormick I had on hand. The last step of the lamb prep is simple, let stand at room temperature for 1 hour.

After preheating the oven to 450, I started working on the potatoes. Using a handheld mandolin, I sliced 5 potatoes about 1/8 inch thick.

I wasn’t sure if McLagan intended to slice them widthwise or lengthwise, so I figured a mixture wouldn’t hurt. Before I could place the potatoes in the pan, I drizzled a tablespoon or so of olive oil in the pan.

Now the potatoes can be added and seasoned with the usual salt and pepper.

Since an hour had passed, I seasoned the lamb with salt and pepper and placed the rounded side down on the potatoes.

From here it was into the 450 degree oven to roast for 15 minutes.

Now the temperature is lowered the usual 350 and the lamb is left to roast for 1 to 1 ¼ hours or until 135 degrees.

About an hour later, I took the temperature of the lamb and was shocked to see it had already crested 140.

I immediately pulled it out of the oven, put the roast on a platter, covered it with foil and let it rest for 15 or so minutes.

In the meantime, I turned the oven back to 450 and put the potatoes back in to crisp up.

In no time at all, I had a pan of crispy, lamb scented potatoes.

Now it was time to carve the lamb.

My previously mentioned lack of experience with lamb should meant I wasn’t really sure how to cut this roast.

Even so, I managed to cut off a few test slices and they were a beautiful medium rare. The flavors were wonderful, and McLagan’s recipe had performed flawlessly, as usual.

With its unusually large number of recipes for joints of lamb, I’m sure I’ll be paying a number of visits to Jennifer McLagan and her book, “Bones”. In the meantime, I’ll do a little studying to see if this was a normal cut for a lamb shoulder or did those butchers in Kosciusko do something odd again?

Croissant D'Or - New Orleans

Whenever I head out of town, I always try and get a few recommendations for places to eat. The last time I was in New Orleans, my friend Stephen recommended Croissant D’Or as a place to check out; unfortunately, I didn’t make it down to the quarter. This time I was determined to see how good the golden croissant was for breakfast.

Located only a few blocks from Decatur, I was amazed I had never walked past Croissant D’Or. Walking inside, I was greeted by a charming neighborhood coffee shop with a whole litany of baked goods to choose from.

On one side of the counter were all the dessert items. There were plenty of napoleons and other sweets to choose from.

Further down was a huge selection of their namesake. It’s no easy task choosing the right croissant, especially when you can have almond, chocolate, apple, raspberry, blueberry, ham & cheese, or simply plain.

I decided to step with a couple of old standards and see how they were.

You can never go wrong with a chocolate or an almond croissant.

First up was the almond croissant.

I was already a fan of the presentation. The glaze and flecks of almond were a nice touch. Inside was a flakey and tender interior, but to my surprise there wasn’t any almond paste. As often as not, the almond croissants I’ve encountered have a bit of almond paste or what looks like marzipan in the middle. Even without the paste, this was a very good croissant.

Being a little sneaky, I was able to steal bite of a ham & cheese croissant.

There wasn’t too much ham, but the cheese had been liquefied and was simply delicious.

Lastly was the chocolate croissant.

The croissant was flakey and tender like the others, but inside this one was a nugget of bittersweet chocolate. Sure, I could complain there isn’t enough chocolate, but I’ve never seen a croissant stuffed to the gills with chocolate, and I don’t think I would enjoy it. Here you can savor the excellent pastry and have a few bites in the middle ameliorated with an excellent piece of chocolate.

What about the coffee?

Like their pastries, Croissant D’Or has a quality product in their coffee. I was surprised that the café au lait had an almost natural sweetness to it.

Of course, I couldn’t leave Croissant D’Or without a to go box of pastries.

I helped myself to a few of the fleur de lys cookies, not to mention a few Napoleans and croissants. The bottom line is Croissant D’Or is more than worth a visit, but make sure you bring cash.

Luke - New Orleans

With August and La Provence under my belt, it was time to try the third of John Besh’s restaurants. Luke is Besh’s attempt at an old world style Brasserie, complete with a pretty solid list of Belgian and German beers and relatively reasonably priced French reds and whites.

Being located in the CBD, I half expected Luke to be relatively empty for a Thursday night. Inside, my expectations were shattered. Luke was a loud and lively place. As I was shown to my table, I couldn’t help but stare at the fully stocked raw bar.

Once seated, I was immediately flummoxed. There wasn’t a single item on the menu that I didn’t like. I honestly wanted to try everything. Conveniently, the assiette de charcuterie allowed me to try all of the cold appetizers.

Even for a charcuterie plate, this is a very busy plate.

The first item on the plate was a few slices of veal salami. I’ve never had a veal based cured meat, and while this was tasty, it had an odd musty flavor. Later, the chef came out and informed me that this veal was a locally bred and was actually made and cured at La Provence.

Ever since my meal at La Provence, I’ve been aching for more of their pate. Thankfully, the pate of Louisiana rabbit and duck livers was spectacular and assuaged my cravings. This pate was creamy and delicious. It has just enough of an irony finish, making it another homerun for Besh.

I, like most people, had an initial aversion to hogshead cheese, but I’ve since grown past that. At Luke, the hog’s head cheese is known as badischer presskopf and is served with radishes and house-made pickles.

The pickles are a great addition to the charcuterie plate as their tart flavor really cuts through all the fat.

Back to the head cheese, this was a very good & pungent piece of meat. There was a lot of black pepper and a very meaty taste. The pepper jelly on top really makes the whole dish work. As for the radishes, I suppose it was good for a radish.

Here we have a piece of wild boar and I’m honestly not sure how it was prepared. While there was a fair amount of pork flavor to the dish, I didn’t find it on par with some of the other charcuterie plate offerings.

Lastly there was a rillette of Berkshire pork and it was just like I expected. It was creamy and deliciously porky. As odd as it sounds, there was simply too much on the charcuterie plate. No matter how much I wanted to, I simply couldn’t finish all of the offerings. It’s not often that a charcuterie plate is so filling, but maybe it should be.

Even though the charcuterie plate was so filling, I soldiered on. One thing I knew I had to try was the matzo ball and roast chicken soup.

You rarely see matzo ball soup on a menu in the South and I was extremely curious to see what Besh had done with the it.

From the first spoonful, this soup had a very dark and rich flavor with the hearty carrions and onions to match. The matzo ball was your standard heavy, dense affair. It’s not what I’ve come to expect in a matzo ball soup, but a nice variation on the standard. I’m excited to make this one at home as the recipe is in Besh’s new cookbook, “My New Orleans”.

Throughout the meal, my waiter had been more than accommodating as I had waxed and waned over my choice of entrée. I knew I couldn’t leave this brasserie without trying the fries and the waiter reinforced that opinion. He said Luke was known for their fries and that they were excellent.

I’m happy to say there is still some truth in advertising. These fries were amazingly tender and crispy at the same time and had just the perfect amount of salt. As simple as French fries are, it’s a rarity to find fries that are made as well as those at Luke.

The Luke Burger was another one of my waiter’s recommendations.

With tomatoes, Allen Benton’s bacon, caramelized onions and Emmenthaler cheese, this was a busy, yet simple burger. I’m always a fan of Benton’s extra smoky bacon and with the caramelized onions, it was a dynamite combination. While the patty itself was superb, the Emmenthaler cheese really tied the whole burger together.

Aside from the French fries, the waiter had been heavily pushing the vanilla scented duck. I’m never one to turn down a good duck, but I wasn’t prepared for what was about to arrive. Once the waiter was within 10 feet of my table, the potent, delicious smell of vanilla hit me.

I apologize for the subpar pictures as they don’t’ do the duck justice.

However, pictures without a flash are worse. Still the duck itself was deliciously moist, no doubt a result of the brining.

As good as the duck was on its own, the mayhaw sauce underneath was simply amazing. The sauce really made the dish for me.

Yes, the haricot verts were very good, but they took a backseat to potatoes roasted in duck fat. This dish really was an absolute study in excess and I only regret that it came after the filling charcuterie plate. However, I’m happy to say the duck was just as good at home.

I’m not sure where I would rank Luke in terms of his other restaurants as all three have been exceptional. I really need to visit Besh’s steakhouse, just to say I’ve been to all four. However, there are a few things that stand out at Luke. I love the observation kitchen in the back dining room. I know the majority of the dishes are made in the back, but it’s still comforting to know that at least a small part of the kitchen is on display. However, the most intriguing thing is that Luke is open for breakfast, and with the raw bar opening at 9 am, I’m planning a very interesting breakfast the next time I’m in New Orleans.

Cochon Butcher - New Orleans (Part 3)

I suppose the third time is the charm. I’ve been to Cochon Butcher a number of times and written about it twice. However, the last time I was in New Orleans, I finally had the opportunity to eat lunch at Butcher.

One great thing about Butcher is their menu is constantly changing, but that Thursday there was a particularly delicious selection of daily specials. The first to arrive was the duck pastrami sliders.

I’ve had duck prosciutto before and it was fantastic, but duck pastrami was a new one to me.

Inside the perfectly crisp bread was a combination of amazing, melted cheese and duck. I was surprised at how subtle the duck flavor was. The pastrami flavors really dominated the sandwich, but in a good way.

The next daily special was another combination of meat and starch.

Combining potatoes and sausage might seem a little mundane, but when the potatoes are this well cooked, it all works. Of course, the addition of well caramelized onions and a spicy chorizo really make this dish work very well.

It’s been a while since I enjoyed a good taco, conveniently Butcher had pork tongue tacos as one of their daily specials.

On its own, the tongue was extremely meaty and tasty. When eaten together, the cilantro really dominates the flavor of the taco. I didn’t really see the point of the cabbage in the taco. It doesn’t detract; conversely it doesn’t add anything to the taco either. This was a nice special with a tender, yet firm tongue, but it felt like it was missing something.

I knew I couldn’t have a good review of Butcher without a sandwich.

The gambino sandwich is a busy sandwich. Between the two pieces of bread, house made salami cotto, sopressata, and coppa duke it out with a fresh herb vinaigrette.

This really seems like your typical cold cut sandwich, a lot like the Italian sub at subway, but the house made meats really take this sandwich to another level. Oddly, it’s the vinaigrette that really steals the show as its bold flavors really mask most of the meats. The soppressata is the only meat that is able to shine through.

As if the sandwich wasn’t enough, it came with house made chips. These chips really should be illegal. Being perfectly fried and salted, it was senseless to fight. I had to finish every single one of these chips.

It was February when I first wrote about the food at Cochon Butcher. Here, some eight months later, I finally took the time to eat one of their sandwiches. I suppose, I should ask if it was worth the wait? Yes, it was completely worth it. I’m kicking myself for not eating their sandwiches earlier. However, as much as I enjoyed my sandwich, the stars of the menu are the small plates. It’s not everywhere you can have pork tongue tacos and duck pastrami sliders in the same place, but it’s all available at Cochon Butcher.

For part one of Cochon Butcher, please click here
For part two of Cochon Butcher, please click here

Shapley's - Jackson

Slowly but surely, I’m making my rounds at the various Jackson culinary institutions, next up is Shapley’s. Started in 1985, Shapley’s has carved itself a comfortable niche as one of the better steakhouses in the Jackson area. Granted, it’s not always great being a big fish in a small pond, but for me Shapley’s sets itself apart for a single reason. This is the only restaurant in Jackson where I can get an order of escargot.

Let’s start with that all important gastropod, and the smell of herb butter dominates the table as it arrives.

Here the snails are served in a typical herbed compound butter, but the puff pastry tops are a nice touch. For some reason, despite the smell, there is no real flavor to this plate of escargot. Where is the garlic and herb flavor?

Another detriment to this dish is the scalding heat. It’s comforting to know that these are fresh from the oven, but unless you want to burn the hell out of your mouth, you’ll have to wait for these snails to cool down. It’s hard to be patient when everyone else is enjoying an appetizer, and often times, I suffer through the scalding heat and join everyone else.

Next up is a plate of Hudson Valley foie gras that has been seared and served over a wild mushroom ragout and port reduction.

First off, I know I’ve become spoiled with the bounty of selection in modern day grocery stores and specialty markets, but I’ll never call a button mushroom, a wild mushroom. Anyway, the foie gras itself is a real treat, with a very nice sear. The port reduction is an especially nice compliment to the liver. As a whole, this is a pleasant appetizer, but it’s kept from greatness by the banality of the button mushrooms.

What’s a steakhouse without a simple salad covered in a thick, creamy dressing?

There seems to be a whole cup of parmesan peppercorn dressing on my plate, completely negating any positive effect of the salad. Health reasons aside, it really is a creamy and delicious dressing.

Now, it’s time to move onto the main course. You should know by now, that means sides dishes.

Some people may argue that a baked potato is a better fit for a steak dinner, but a good French fry can make the meal. The French fries at Shapley’s aren’t the end all of the potato world, but the seasoning makes up for any of the tuber’s shortcomings.

In an effort to match the huge slabs of meat, steak houses often feature oddly proportioned vegetables. Shapley’s is no exception to this practice.

I spent a fair amount of time in the produce section and I rarely see a bunch of asparagus this size. Annoyingly, the cheese on this dish was haphazardly placed and it’s melted into one huge clump. The spears aren’t badly cooked, but their seasoning leaves a lot to be desired. Try as I might, I can’t enjoy hollandaise with my asparagus, and the hollandaise at Shapley’s doesn’t help change my mind.

Dinner at a steakhouse without a steak would be a travesty. Luckily, Shapley’s had a special on my favorite cut, the bone-in ribeye.

This ribeye was a sight for sore eyes. With a beautiful crust and plenty of marbling, this was steak was almost too fatty, but I’d rather err on the side of caution.

As usual, I had requested an odd temperature for my steak. I’ve found that requesting between medium-rare and medium gives mixed results. I’m happy to say that Shapley’s passed with flying colors.

With a truly delicious pan sauce, an excellent interior temperature, and a quality cut of beef, this was simply a delightful steak dinner. Sure it’s not the best steak dinner I’ve ever had, but Shapley’s has done a very commendable job.

Like almost any restaurant, Shapley’s has it’s fair share of misses. I realize that escargot is a bit of a hard sell in the odd Jackson market, but they need to revisit their recipe and strive for a bolder garlic and herb flavor. Once again, the wait staff was dumbfounded when I asked if the beef was corn fed or corn finished. I know it’s rare for a restaurant to feature anything but corn fed beef, but I’m waiting for a waiter to know that answer offhand.

Shapley’s has been in Jackson for nearly a quarter century, and for a town that seems to celebrate when a new chain arrives, it’s nice to know that a local restaurant has had the success to not only survive, but thrive.