Lola's

futura — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 03:31:16 GMT

Tonight we explored a bit more of New Orleans. We needed some baby food so we identified a Whole Foods on Esplanade just off City Park and decided we'd head that way. Not only was there a Whole Foods, but the Canal Street street-car ran right up to Carrollton Ave and we could transfer to another street-car to head over to the park and Esplanade. We knew little A would love the street-car. He is fascinated with all things train.

It was hovering around dinner time so I jumped online and did a quick Google search on local restaurants that would be relatively close to our initial stop at Whole Foods.

A little join called Lola's showed up. Frommer's had a write up and the quote was, "Please don't put this into the book..." and mentioned it was a great little local joint. It could be exactly what we were looking for, or an over-hyped tourist dive making us wish we had gone elsewhere. It was billed as a good little Spanish place with great paella and garlic shrimp. Ok.

The street-car ride was fairly uneventful except for A eating up every minute. It was apparent on our ride up that as soon as we left the city and headed into midtown that there were vestiges of Katrina's wrath. Several businesses had "Now Open" signs, but many were still boarded up or deserted.

At Carollton we hopped off and waited for the transfer. While we waited, an Explorer dressed like a contractor truck stopped at the light with bass booming, window down. Little A kicked it up spinning in circles and dancing murmuring something about "Digweed, Digweed, Digweed" - as anything dance-music related is "Digweed". All respect to the master, I hope to refine his electronic music identification so that Digweed will be reliably noticed. At this point, 1992 Two Unlimited could be mistakenly flagged as "Digweed".

Giving up on the transfer wait, we began walking down Carrollton to the park where Esplanade branches off and heads back to the river. Dusk was settling in and it was getting fairly dark as we turned down Esplanade. Two women were heading into their house when I turned to ask, "Is there a Whole Foods down here?" Google Maps told me it existed, but the women both stated, "Not anymore." I asked, "Is Lola's still there?" "Yes, next door to Terranova's".

It took a moment to hit me but we had just been talking about Terranova's because my wife had mentioned it being featured in an article on Marketplace. It's one of a dying breed of locally owned supermarkets. It was also located in New Orleans and had re-opened after Katrina and has been getting great business since. When it hit me, we were both pretty excited. We enjoy running across little things like that.

Alas, they had no baby food but we picked up some essentials and then made our way to Lola's just next door.

Lola's is a small little joint filled with paintings from local artist Corey Allen of Moss Street Gallery. Unpretentious comes to mind. Simple, straight-forward. Frommer's said there are typically lines out the door and there is usually a wait. Katrina has obviously had its effect here - and it was Wednesday night. Only two or three tables were filled upon our arrival. The waiter was friendly and very helpful. Even in such a small space, they welcomed our stroller and allowed us prop it up near our table.

Upon sitting down on the sturdy, hard-wood chairs it scraped against the cement floor and made a yelping noise exactly like that of a dog. None other than our ex-dog, Flush. Little A was instantly interested and began looking under the table for the "dog". "Bush?" (Bush as in Flush with a B) he would inquire. He was sure there was a dog under our table for the duration of the meal. Very cute. But also annoying when we could not convince him there was no dog under our table.

Service was fairly prompt, and very friendly. We ordered a bottle of sangria, and an appetizer of garlic shrimp - supposedly their specialty. Special it was and had a great taste. A plate of 3 warm pieces of bread were brought out with a home-made garlic butter that was heavenly. The garlic shrimp was very tasty - a bit spicy, very-garlic, but rich in spice. Not fishy shrimp at all.

For our main course we had salmon and lamb. Both were superb. My salmon was cooked "medium" and was super-tender, and very rich in flavor. Cooked simply in a red-pepper sauce - but very lightly dressed. A little bowl of sauce on the side had a pesto flavor and complimented the salmon very nicely.

The lamb was a stew with vegetables. Very rich, but the best lamb my wife has ever had. She said, "I've been cooking lamb all wrong."

For desert was opted for the flour-less tort. It was a solid slice of pure chocolate bliss. A piece of cake wishing it were a candy bar. It was dense like a brick of mud, but so far from a brick of mud in taste it probably ruins the analogy to relate it as such. The tort was possibly the best tort I've ever had. It was firm but tender, and not too moist. Topped with white and milk chocolate chips and a dollop of real whip cream and glazed with a raspberry/cherry type sauce. It went down fast.

The boy had migrated into pre-break-down mode so we knew it was near time to leave. He also paused thoughtfully half-way through and decided to bless us with a super-full, nasty dirty diaper. We had let him sit in it long enough and we had to get out to get him changed.

Lola's only accepts cash. So be prepared if you indulge in as much as we did. It's not overly expensive, but it adds up fast. I guess more so when you're not used to buying appetizers or alcohol when eating out. Main courses were roughly 10-20 dollars.

Visit Lola's.

After changing the boy, we headed back via a route recommended by the waiter to get us back to Canal St. faster than going back up to Carrollton. On our way we passed a film set. A neighbor to the filming stated it was for a movie called, "College". A semi-clone of "Revenge of the Nerds". A house was decorated like a frat house and its lawn spread with tents of filming gear. We didn't see any cameras roll, or anyone worth knowing. What is most interesting is that this type of movie is actually receiving funding - from someone. Someone wants to spend their money producing this movie and making it into a visual reality. I don't have any blockbuster ideas at the moment, but I certainly could come up with something better than "College" to spend someone's million bucks on.

We got back to Canal St. and hopped on the street-car to head back downtown.

All in all a great evening and a fun time exploring another part of New Orleans.

It's definitely a city in disrepair, but life is going on. If you have an opportunity to visit and contribute to the place, you should.

Pictures by Corey Allen of Lola's:

Lola's Reopens

Almost Six at Lola's

Lola's

Lola's at Night

SIGGRAPH is actually happening now.

futura — Wed, 11 Aug 2004 05:20:00 GMT

That means Ryan was wrong saying it already happened. I guess that's what you get basing your life on Discreet product announcements. Does Ryan have much to look forward to other than Max 8? Just kidding.

SIGGRAPH Official Blog

futura — Wed, 11 Aug 2004 05:17:00 GMT

http://siggraph.blogspot.com/

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Lola's

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