The Perfect Beignet

 Seriously, is there anything better than a hot beignet, covered in powdered sugar , puffy and a tad crispy, fresh from the oil? Like gumbo, boiled crawfish and stuffed mirlitons, NOLA does it best. 

I live in a "next door to LA" state. And while turducken, stuffed chickens, gumbo, etc. are on my menu all the time, I haven't ever tried to make a beignet.  I reviewed every last recipe, and yes, even the one on the box, and it was a real trial and error thing. I think New Orleans girls are very adventurous in their culinary skills. But this one involves a candy thermometer, a special peanut oil, a frying basket, and if you are smart, a protective glove and some flour to throw on the fire you could create.  

My first batch look like tired little brown roofing shingles. But I dusted them with powdered sugar and ate one anyway.  The next batch was a little thicker and puffed up a bit, but seemed a touch gummy inside. No one wants to eat paste. Well, over the age of 4.

Not to be deterred, I thickened it up a little more and VOILA! and TaDa.  Perfect.    

What brought this up was a friend from Seattle who texted me "where is the best beignet in NO?" 

So I contacted the 5 people I text regularly who are still in New Orleans- and I got 5 different answers. One said "Cafe du Monde but ONLY at City Park", another said "Cafe du Monde but only downtown". 

Etc.  So obviously, New Orleans is still in the beignet business big time.  And I wish they'd open up here.

Prayers for East Tennessee and North Carolina-- I guess Katrina didn't teach FEMA much, did it?

Can Covid do what Katrina didn't?

It must be time to post again- I should reread what I've posted up until now, but well, I'm lazy.

Mardi Gras came in 2020, and it is highly possible it brought COVID to my home town. 

There is no real way to know- NOLA is, after all, a port and a huge tourist attraction. People come and go, and post-Katrina, I think it would be fair to say a number of people from "elsewhere" came to save NOLA from itself (or thought they could), and those people would have to go back home every now and then and bring in the virus.Who knows.

In third grade, we took Louisiana history. We had a lovely and well organized history book that was interesting to most of us. We, being post-war baby boomer kids, were exposed to history all the time. Louisiana is rich in history- some good, some not so good. And though we had no context, we were ages 7 and 8 and still had imaginations. What other state had so many flags? Pirates! Cajuns! So many wonderful projects to do for history. And the obligatory laying of wreaths at our founders.

We learned about disease, too. Being a swampy, tropical, mosquito infested city,  we actually were known for having experts in tropical medicine.  

In my early childhood, there was polio. Mothers hardly knew what to do about it, so they made you wash your hands before coming in to eat, and made you come inside in the summer at dusk.  Mothers knew the disease could come for their children at any time and without any warning.  They prayed for relief.

We all got the childhood diseases: measles, mumps, rubella, rubeola,  impetigo. We were given obligatory tetanus and pertussis shots and a smallpox vaccine. The polio vaccine took a while.

We stood in line in first grade (or so) for the first polio vaccines. No one was allowed to cry. Some parents attended to give the stern parental stink-eye to the whiners and runners. Since back then every parent was YOUR parent  ("in loco parentis" for you legal types) and tattled mercilessly to your mother. So you'd suck it up and stick out your very skinny arms to get the shot.  No one was let off. And we were sacrificed on the altar of modern medicine that was attempting to rid the planet of the scourge of highly communicable childhood disease. (By third grade there were sugar cubes. That worked.)

We got to feel invincible. So invincible that people would actually refuse to vaccinate their children one day.


And yet, NOLA is in the midst of a pandemic. And it's a no-herd-immunity-go-until-it-can-go-no-more disease.  

The City that Care Forgot also forgot that those little invisible microbes don't care about parties or dances or graduations or mothers or grandmothers, etc. They just invade your body and brain and lungs and no one can save you- yet. But soon. Soon people who have studied a great deal will figure out what to do. 

Eventually it will end. But NOLA is a vulnerable city all of the time. We are huggers, and kissers, and people who love other people. We love to share food, and we love to be alive.  You'd think those positive human enthusiasms would spare NOLA some grief.  But this time, it will not. 

My prayers for my beloved city and my precious friends who live there still. This will pass, though the cost is yet to be revealed.  But it will pass. And we'll drive to see you when it is over.

Another Reunion

Why these lags? Well- there IS a story. There always is.

After my last post, I had a bizarre thing happen. Despite my husband's constant reminding that my email POP account was risky, I loved the convenience of it. It was the shortest email ever in history. My first name, then my provider (a TWO letter company) then dot net.  NINE total letters. I couldn't let go. The provider had been sold to 4 companies over the 15 years I had that email. One company didn't even notice I was there- no bills, nothing. But the last purchaser was obviously a far more organized company. They didn't even notice the 15 or so people left over from 4 sales ago. Until they did. Then, without notice or warning, they removed the accounts. They refused to open it back up unless the mail was changed to the name of their company. It was GONE. Now, I have an outlook account- had it for a looooong time. I used it for spam. But unfortunately, I didn't use the outlook account when I opened up my gmail account. SO now, I had no way to prove that I had a gmail account. They just wouldn't let me do anything. Until yesterday. Then, for some reason, they accepted my information and pleas for help, and they gave me back my email account, which is linked to my blog. Hallelujah!

Now, on to the 50th reunion for high school in NOLA. Last June.

There was a luncheon at a country club- I didn't go. My husband and a few friends were appalled. Why wouldn't I go??? The answer was simple- I didn't want to. Unless it is a matter of having to be respectful or polite, I don't do things that are unnecessary anymore. I'd seen everyone I wanted to see a few years ago, and facebook has shown me the others I might be missing. So why go? I have no sentimentality about high school- not in a mean or petty way. It was fifty years ago, and it was just high school.  3 years of my life. That is it. I am not sure what it IS about high school People who have gone on to great success, who have overcome huge personal events and triumphed, who have gone on to grow and blossom, have trepidation about high school reunions. Everyone wants to look younger, happier, and just better than they did at the most awkward and often competitive and confusing times of their lives. Fine. But I didn't want to sit at a table, sing the class song, and act like I remembered what people were  talking about. Not because I'm a bitch- I am not. I was fairly successful by high school rules- I had a lot of friends and a lot of fun.  But that was then and this is now.

However, there was a dance that evening.  And many of the people I really liked would go. It was limited to 150 couples (or people -I know, big difference, but it could have been either at that point), I have to hand it to the people who organized it- the decor was fantastic, the hired band was great, the former high schoolers who were band members played the second half. I paid for food but didn't eat it. I got to hang out with some of the people I actually KNEW and socialized with. And everyone was still fun.  So I couldn't thank all of them enough. 

It was all almost enough to make me resolve to move back home. To go home to my beloved city- the city that is dying and losing its beauty- the monuments torn down-ugly cement blocks left. The crime- oh my, the crime. The corrupt government. The pitiful management of infrastructure.
Hold on, I'm getting somewhere with this.

The dance was held on the 3rd floor of an office building off of Causeway blvd- across from Lakeside Shopping Center.  We left the dance a little early- being non-drinkers, it is always good to leave before the last song. We had parked on the feeder road for Causeway Blvd- in an empty strip mall lot. We got in our car at 9:59, And as we got into our car to drive off, this happened:

http://www.wwltv.com/news/crime/jpso-family-carjacked-at-gunpoint-outside-lakeside-mall-suspects-arrested-after-chase/450033937

By the time we got back to our downtown hotel, it was all over the news. And I cried. I could never live under that stress. I could not believe this happened- virtually within our sight, Just a minute after we left. I don't want to go into the what ifs- it was that close to home for us. And, of course, it wasn't about us.   I can't go home. I just can't.  If I could fix it, I would.  But I won't remember the best parts of our visit- I will remember this.  Isn't that an awful thing to have to say?

Time flies

I finally got to go back home last year. Here is what I did do:

1. I ate at Brennan's. It was a wedding rehearsal dinner that probably cost the groom's parents a fortune. Some people got so drunk that it was embarrassing. Such a beautiful, old place where I've spent some great and some very odd experiences. This one was both.  And now I see it is closed. Ah well. At least it wasn't the fault of the drunks at the dinner I attended.
2. I saw the people I wanted to see. We all had dinner together, and it was lovely. I cherish the picture we took of all of us. I miss my friends- some drove in from Baton Rouge and from across the lake. We said hi to Harry Connick who was hanging out in the parking lot for the restaurant.
3. I got to walk in the quarter without feeling like something bad could happen. Pre Katrina I was in NOLA and a dude got too close to me and then tried to yank my purse off my arm. I kept it, and then I gave him the finger as he ran off and looked over his shoulder.  It was in broad daylight in front of a lot of people. But this visit, I felt okay.
4. I got to eat at Drago's in Metairie. Ah, heaven.
5. I went to a wedding that had lots of fun drama going on. That rocks!
6. Ate at Commander's Palace.

This is what I didn't do:
1. Visit the grave where my adoptive grandfather and adoptive parents are planted. No point except to see if the people at Metairie Cemetery cleaned it up after Katrina. And that just wasn't what I wanted to do.
2. Eat at Deanie's in Metairie. That was a disappointment.
3. Go dancing at Tipitina's, visit the wonderful zoo, ride the streetcar, and in general, act like a real tourist. We were too busy.

And now, I read NOLA.com every day and it seems that it just gets worse and worse. Now I don't want to go back to the quarter or downtown because I am, for the first time, really afraid I will get hurt. What the heck, New Orleans?? Yeah, I know I'm not there for you. But where is your law enforcement? Where is the national guard for you? Can't you go door to door and ask people to STOP the violence?  Even convince them to just stop for a week?

I know other cities have their own problems- but you, NOLA, are the best city in the world to me. You are unique and special. And people want to visit you. But they don't want to die for you. I sometimes feel that my sadness for NOLA will never go away. How can there be no solution? How can people continue to put up with it? How helpless must they feel? 

I am so sorry for the people who stay and fight to clean it up. They are such generous and loving people- they are proud of their city and home. Maybe that is the problem- maybe generations of poor education and gang violence and the stupid ideas that shooting or stabbing someone is the way to settle a problem, well, maybe we should start with that and have a huge PR effort to get everyone to STOP and THINK before you SHOOT or STAB. Then just STOP.  It isn't about the guns and knives and fists, it is definitely about the PEOPLE. And that is so much harder than controlling any weapon.

It is easy for me to talk- I don't live there. I envy the brave and committed people who work every day to make the city a better and safer place.  I hope that sometime I can post how safe NOLA has become. Because prayers haven't worked.

Mardi Gras

The problem with a blog is that the only editor you have is yourself. So you can repeat yourself or retell a story and not know it. But today I was thinking about Mardi Gras. Since that is a mostly childhood memory, maybe I'll repeat myself, and maybe not.
I was pretty lucky- my father had a business on St Charles Ave right on the parade route. The parade went UP St Charles to uptown and back down St Charles to downtown- it was just a matter of crossing the neutral ground. The neutral ground is unique to NOLA- other people have different names for the area of grass divider between two sides of a street. But in NOLA, it is the neutral ground. So to see the parade twice, all I had to do was cross the neutal ground. My father loved Mardi Gras and my mother didn't. Our entire family benefitted from a safe place to park their car, a clean bathroom and plenty of food and drink at ground level on the parade route. And despite the fact that NOLA has always been dangerous, my parents (and other parents) gave free reign- it was okay to run out into the crowds and return dirty and sometimes mildly injured if you brought back shiny beads.  If we kids saw someone we knew, well- all the better excuse to run up the block to say hi to their family. The assumption back then was basically that no one wanted someone else's kid- for almost any reason. The assumption was that you would come back. I'm sure there was wholesale panic if you disappeared forever, but I never knew of a kid that did.
Every year was another costume- usually a witch because it recycled Halloween. But one year I was in a Japanese satin kimono type top with black satin pants- it remains my favorite costume ever. I was so sad when I outgrew it. I have a picture. I should post it sometime.
My father had lived in NOLA since he graduated from high school at the age of 16. He first worked as a street car conductor and loved it. But he had years and years of Mardi Gras tales. My personal favorite was when he witnessed a man being killed at Lee Circle- a crowd was watching a fight and the aggressor pulled out an ICE PICK (imagine my vivid imagination on that item!) and stabbed another man in the heart.  That permanently put a little dark shadow on the festivities for me.
I was always told to "be careful"- but in a city with ice pick murderers, well, it was so overwhelming that we all just ignored it. How can you "be careful" in a city where people kill one another? There is no careful- so you might as well just live.  And we all did.
My last Mardi Gras was when I was 22. I'd graduated from college and was dating a great guy who had moved to NOLA after college. He wanted the adventure and he got it. I got hit in the eye by a flying elbow, and it split the skin over my eye which bled and made me appear to have been badly beaten.  But I REALLY had to go to the bathroom after 2 or 3 hurricanes, and people couldn't send me to the front of the line quick enough. I'd had enough booze not to hurt much, but I did sort of play it up. Girls will definitely move away from someone with blood all over their face.  I'm a smart girl and I had a bandaid in my purse- so it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. But that was really my last Mardi Gras. NOLA was turning ugly then- the crime rate had begun to soar and friends of mine had armed guards at their uptown parties. People fled the city.
But when I was little- the flambeaux and the beads and the costumes and being up at night- well, it was just magical. I hope the magic has returned. I truly do. I just don't have the guts to try it. My Mardi Gras memories are too sweet.

The First Oyster

I actually remember my first oyster. I was 4. My father loved the outdoors. His favorites hobbies were golf and fishing and eating. His Cajun heritage was reflected in his personality, and his love of food. He built a huge bar-be-que out of old brick- it even had a chimney on it. He could smoke food, grill food and roast food on the outdoor project.

I was game to eat anything. Except liver. And oysters. But my dad would bring home a sack of oysters and shuck them in the back yard. I'd watch him eat them. And he'd always say "I know you really want one of these...I know you do". And I'd shake my head.

But by the time I was 4, I was feeling pretty left out. Everyone else seemed to love those grey, squishy looking things. I couldn't bear to even touch them. They were, well, yucky to touch, dicey to smell and really ugly to look at. But I finally couldn't take the teasing. And the worst was that there were other kids in the neighborhood who did eat them.

I remember my dad first letting me taste the juice left in the shell- cold and salty. That wasn't so bad after all. Then he gave me a cracker with ketchup and horseradish. That was pretty good, too. So he picked a small one, freed its foot from the shell, and then slid it into my mouth with the admonition that I didn't need to chew it.

It sat in my mouth for a few seconds while I tried to decide if I should gag it out, or swallow it. And while it sat there, the marvelous taste of the fresh gulf oyster began to change my mind. And I gave it two chews and swallowed. I probably ate another dozen. My dad was delighted. He couldn't help himself.

Since that day, I have had thousands of oysters. Trust me- raw, fried, pan fried, Italian, etc.

There is only one way I won't eat them, and that is in gumbo. I like the flavor they give, but I'll fish them out before we eat. They get too rubbery.

But the day of the BP oil spill, I sat stunned into silence watching the oil pour out over the precious oyster beds. What would life be for a New Orleans child without raw oysters from the coast of Louisiana? Who knows.

The Canals

When I was growing up, there were open canals everywhere. During big afternoon thunderstorms, they would fill with drain water, sometimes at an alarming rate, washing their ecosystems of larvae, snakes, road debris and trash all the way down to other canals or ditches that presumably dumped them into Lake Pontchartrain. The city was founded on the Mississippi- which is, in its own way, a huge drainage ditch for a lot of the United States. And being a city under water anyway, riding through puddles, seeing cars occasionally floating down the road, those were all things hardly worth noticing. My first "canal" was the one down the center of Mirabeau Avenue. At that time, Mirabeau was a divided street. And a very exciting one. People sped down Mirabeau racing between City Park and Elysian Fields. It was forbidden to cross the street alone. I had no reason to cross completely. The lure was the often swamp- like canal, and its wealth of squiggly water creatures, snakes, dragonflies, water beetles, dead rats, and trash items thrown from passing cars. I cannot remember the actual sights, but I can feel the oppressive summer humidity that came from it. The weedy grasses that grew on the sides of the canal were cut once every two weeks or so by a huge piece of equipment that left the dead grass to compact and decay leading to even more heat being generated. Going to explore was a hot, itchy, sweaty, fascinating and scary thing all at one time. I didn't dare go with my brother or his friends- they would have pushed me into the water. I knew that much. But I could go by myself if I figured no one would miss me for a while. It was a short dash across the street and then a furtive climb down to the gummy mess. My brother had terrorized me with stories of how quick sand would eat you alive with no hope of escape. And I was never too sure what or where the quick sand was, but if it was anywhere real, then it was probably in that muck down in the canal.
My brother was particularly fascinated by Bayou St John. He and a friend found a wooden crate which they put a cardboard box into. When my mother saw them, they explained they had made a boat and were going to put it into Bayou St John. My mother forbade them to do so. And then, an hour later, they had disappeared. No amount of calling or searching produced a sign of either child OR the box. Frantic calls were made to the police and a search was begun. Neighbors walked the streets calling for him. Police searched the banks of all the canals and ditches. Six hours later, driven by hunger probably, my brother and his friend showed up dirty on the front porch. After extensive questioning, they revealed that they thought it was pretty funny to see people running around looking for them. They DID go to Bayou St John, and the "boat" sank before they could get in it. So they wandered about and then hid in a vacant and overgrown lot for hours watching people running around yelling their names. My brother was spanked, thrown in a bathtub, not given dinner and put in his room. All to my delight. Who doesn't like being the kid who looks pretty faultless?

The next canal was the one running on West Esplanade in Metairie. By the time we could hit this canal, we were fully independent with very little parental supervision. We could ride our bikes there, hop off and hide our bikes in the weeds, and use our BB and pellet guns to shoot cans and whatever else was worth shooting. We could catch bugs of interest and put them in jars. We had a game where we would pull weeds that looked like spears out of their casings and throw them at one another. We could be about as free as kids could be. But it didn't last long because subdivisions were rapidly encroaching on the area we used as a playground. This was the best time because we were boys and girls together- before puberty came to change how we saw one another. We were all just friends. We did stuff together, got in trouble together and were all punished together. It was worth it.
Slowly but surely, a lot of those ditches and canals have been covered over. Massive projects laid huge pipes and covered them up.

But I am sorry for the kids who never got to do those things. Sure, we could have died, gotten life threatening infections, been run over, shot our eyes out, whatever the fear was. But we loved it.