Emeril's New Orleans

Emeril's New Orleans

800 Tchoupitoulas Street

New Orleans, LA 70130

(504) 528-9393

For our last dinner in New Orleans, we celebrated the end of the week at Emeril's. We walked over after work, being early, we sat down and watched the team get ready for dinner service.

Right on the dot, the hostess showed us to our table. We were in the middle of the dining room, with a view of the bar and the open kitchen. Gosh, how I would love to sit by the kitchen! I kept looking at the lucky few who were there during the dinner. I like how you could sit and chat with a chef there.

The service was incredible as it was a rather large group of staff who stood ready for the guests. Our waiter, ever the gentlemen, even draped our napkins over our lap. Even for Howard! This immediately brought back the restaurant war episode on Top Chef Canada where Darryl Crumb was chaffed at for doing so.

Mmm, while we waited for our food, we were given a trio of baked goods to snack on. The cornbread was especially noteworthy. We also learned to stop eating them, because the staff would immediately refill your plate with more.

This is the Creole marinated calamari: flash fried with olive salad, smoked tomato sauce, and Parmesan.

Howard also decided to get the gumbo of the day, which was seafood! So hearty and satisfying.

Not captured on film, but the gumbo is brought out in a pot and they pour it out into the bowl when they serve you.

My colleague ordered the escargots in a Yukon gold potato fondue with amarelo, chorizo, parsley, and country bread. Luckily, we got to try some too and it was delish! We've had really bad escargots in Toronto (grainy ones - yelch), but these ones were clean and that fondue!! My goodness!

I picked the sweet barbecue glazed salmon with andouille-potato hash, crispy onions, and house-made Worcestershire. I don't know how they did it, but the salmon skin was so nice and crispy - the perfect amount of crunch. And I love potato hash!

Howard went with the sorghum smoked duck breast with "dirty" fregola sarda, red cabbage choucroute, and truffle pate.

If you want to see how fancy "Mac n’ Cheese" looks like, my colleague ordered it! There was sautéed gulf shrimp with trofie pasta, vermouth cream, guanciale, and brioche crumbs.

For dessert, we shared J.K.’s chocolate soufflé. I still had soufflé on the mind!

But really, I had every intentions of ordering Emeril’s famous banana cream pie (graham cracker crust, caramel sauce, and chocolate shavings), so maybe next time!