We have started.

D, my sister, and I arrived at my parents' house in Baton Rouge
Saturday evening around dinner time. Mom and Dad treated us right
with shrimp over panko-crusted eggplant disks for dinner. It was
fine.

But our quest was for rémoulade, and rémoulade would be our topic for
the next three days. At stake was the Great Rémoulade Hypothesis
(GRH): All iterations of rémoulade are different from all others, and
all are good.

It was to be the first test of the GRH. We were able to sample four
rémoulades and rémoulade-like substances between Sunday and Tuesday
afternoon, although we weren't really trying to get all we could in
that period of time, to be sure. We were surprised to find that our
(admittedly small and extremely unscientific) sample of rémoulade
offerings between Baton Rouge and Lafayette, LA over three days turned
up no oil-based rémoulades. All were mayonnaise-based (or something -
see below). I'm certain that there are still many examples of
oil-based rémoulades out there, but none presented themselves to us
this time out.

There's always next time.

Sunday, July 29 2007: We had lunch at Jones Creek Café & Oyster Bar
(15005 Market St., Baton Rouge). Our rémoulade came as a salad, which
is typical. The sauce was mayo-based with finely minced sweet
pickles, a hint of ketchup, parsley, horseradish, paprika, Creole
mustard, and maybe some cayenne. The ingredients here and elsewhere
are only our best guess, and are surely subject to revision. I asked
our server what was in the rémoulade only to be told that it had
rémoulade in it. She did assure us that it was made on premises. The
shrimp served with the sauce were small, cocktail-size numbers, and
were not worthy of the noble sauce, which nicely complimented other
items on the table: Soft shell crab, fried shrimp, and French fries in
particular benefited from more than a passing acquaintance with the
Jones Creek rémoulade.

Here's the score for Jones Creek rémoulade:
D gave it 6 shrimp.
My sister gave it 6 shrimp, also.
I was more generous and gave it 8 shrimp, but I was really jonesing
for rémoulade when I got there.

Monday, July 30: The whole lot of us drove over to West Baton Rouge
Parish to discover what we could find in Brusly at a place called
Louisiana Bayou Bistro, about three miles north of Plaquemine. It's a
deceptively laid out, rambling eatery on Louisiana Highway 1 not far
south of the Intracoastal Canal. The menu offered fried crawfish
tails with rémoulade, and I pounced. But when I ordered, our waitress
(Sharon, she informed us) acted hesitant and said she'd check on the
"rome-eh lahwrd." The generous mound of wonderfully breaded and fried
crawfish tails was delivered sauceless, and I asked again for
rémoulade. She returned with cocktail sauce (ketchup and horseradish
mostly), with tartar sauce, and with "bayou sauce." We don't really
have any rome-eh-lahwrd sauce, she explained, but the bayou sauce
should do. It was a sweeter variation on the standard
mayonnaise-based rémoulade (probably too much ketchup), which was much
improved by the generous application of Louisiana hot sauce. I mean
the kind made from cayenne and vinegar, not Tabasco.

This left us in a quandary. Was it rémoulade or wasn't it? What
constitutes the limit case for a condiment? What does it mean when
somebody gives you a rémoulade substitute and you proceed to doctor it
as you are able under the circumstances to resemble the real thing?
How can we relate this state of affairs to the GRH in a meaningful
way?

The sco
D gave it 2 shrimp.
My sister concurred at 2 shrimp.
I gave it 4. What can I say? I'm a pushover.

One thing that perhaps mollified my judgment was the smokehouse salads
D and my sister got there. Anybody who can make an apple-smoked
andouille vinaigrette for a salad of mixed greens with sugared bacon
bits and blue cheese deserves consideration - even if their wait staff
contradicts their menu on the important subject of rémoulade.

While on the west bank of the river, we dropped into Benoit's Country
Meat Block in Addis, LA, a little farther south from Brusly on LA 1.
Setting aside the image of a "meat block" (because we've had their
cured meats before), we shopped for tasty treats to haul back to Cow
Hill. I contemplated the smoked half chickens but settled on the pig
meat: tasso and both hot and mild andouille in this case. I had that
vinaigrette in mind for later, you see.

Today, July 31, we hit two places for rémoulade, and struck the mother
lode with one.

Driving west out of Baton Rouge across the river on US 190 into Pointe
Coupee Parish, we had a particular place in our sights: Joe's Dreyfus
Store restaurant in Livonia, LA, on the banks of Bayou Grosse Tete.
I'd eaten there some years back and had fond memories of their
marinated crab fingers, even if rémoulade was the point today. The
Dreyfus Store hit it out of the swamp. The rémoulade was ambrosia. It
was served with seven peeled and deveined medium shrimp in a cocktail
glass-***-pudding cup with a sprinkling of chopped scallions and some
iceberg lettuce. The sauce itself was a delightful concatenation of
mustardy mayo (no ketchup) with horseradish, cider vinegar, a little
lemon juice, and a touch of cayenne. There were almost pulverized
flecks of onion and celery in there along with the mustard seeds from
what we assumed was a Creole preparation. We were swooning as we
dipped the shrimp and devoured them. D used the last of hers as a
salad dressing for the lettuce. I told the waitress I wanted to bathe
in her rémoulade.

After our snack, I steered down a country lane south from Livonia
along the bayou to the junction with I-10 and from there across the
rainy Atchafalaya Basin towards Lafayette. Later in the afternoon,
rain squalls looming, we dropped into Prejean's on I-49, a couple of
miles north of I-10 because of a recommendation. Prejean's is said to
be an excellent Cajun eatery, but I and my party were less than
impressed. I ordered shrimp and asparagus rémoulade. Oysters figured
prominently in the other orders at the table, but they also asked for
rémoulade to dress their salads and/or as a condiment with their
seafood selections.

Prejeans' rémoulade was the biggest disappointment of the tour. It
was inexcusably sweet. Although we weren't privy to the recipe, we
concluded that this sad version wasn't even mayonnaise-based, but was
build around Miracle Whip. Inside its cloying sweetness swam bits of
pickle relish (also sweet) and capers. It may or may not have had
hints of horseradish, aromatic vegetables, and lemon juice. But all
were subsumed in a malaise of saccharine gustatory error. My sister
was on the verge of declaring that it wasn't rémoulade at all. In
fact, it wasn't even food.

The sco
D gave it 0 shrimp.
My sister gave it ½ shrimp.
I gave it 1 shrimp (see above pushover).

Back in Cow Hill at last (and with my sister on her way back to
Dallas), I sliced some of Benoit's andouille and fried it in some
olive oil in a pan and then deglazed with brown rice vinegar and added
some Dijon mustard and some sugar to make a vinaigrette for the
shredded cabbage and potato and mixed greens salad I planned for
dinner. With some shallots and home dried tomatoes in the salad
dressing and some roasted pork on top, it was pretty good.
--

modom

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Hello Modom,

Thanks for the excellent reviews of your recent research. It serves as
a fine example of a post! Maybe next time, we can talk you into
researching po'boys or muffalettas. Or, even andouille and boudin; I'm
thinking of Johnson's Grocery in Eunice, LA.

You wrote:

> This left us in a quandary. Was it rmoulade or wasn't it? What
> constitutes the limit case for a condiment? What does it mean when
> somebody gives you a rmoulade substitute and you proceed to doctor it
> as you are able under the circumstances to resemble the real thing?
> How can we relate this state of affairs to the GRH in a meaningful
> way?

Recipes for items like remoulade, which have been around for a while,
seem to generate lots of variation. From oil and mayonnaise based to
catsup based, for example. I've got a recipe from the Caribbean Room at
the Pontchartrain Hotel which calls for 2 gal. of catsup for a 5 gal.
batch. Yikes, that's 40% by volume. And as time goes on, menu
adjectives are becoming more and more meaningless. For example
something like "Chicken a la Scampi with an Alfredo/Sundried Tomato
Dipping sauce". So who's going to draw the line? Do we need a Royal
Academy of Menu Terminology? Registration of recipes? Sounds like a
talk show topic...

Thanks again,
D.M.

modom (palindrome guy) > wrote:
>are only our best guess, and are surely subject to revision. I asked
>our server what was in the rémoulade only to be told that it had
>rémoulade in it.

Well sure. To make rémoulade you take rémoulade and
add rémoulade.

This is the sort of recipé that every kid learns at
the knee of their uncle Justin.

>Here's the score for Jones Creek rémoulade:
>D gave it 6 shrimp.
>My sister gave it 6 shrimp, also.
>I was more generous and gave it 8 shrimp, but I was really jonesing
>for rémoulade when I got there.

Are those 8 little bay shrimp, or those big mofos
you get on the dock in Rocky Point?

>somebody gives you a rémoulade substitute and you proceed to doctor it
>as you are able under the circumstances to resemble the real thing?

I dunno. McDonald's legally sells as "hamburgers"
something that in other contexts might be veterinary
waste...

>The sco
>D gave it 2 shrimp.
>My sister concurred at 2 shrimp.
>I gave it 4. What can I say? I'm a pushover.

I think you should have recused yourself, as, in this case,
you were the chef.

--Blair
"Good excuse to pig out though."

On Wed, 01 Aug 2007 00:56:25 -0500, "modom (palindrome guy)"
> wrote:
<remoulade odyssey omitted>
>Back in Cow Hill at last (and with my sister on her way back to
>Dallas), I sliced some of Benoit's andouille and fried it in some
>olive oil in a pan and then deglazed with brown rice vinegar and added
>some Dijon mustard and some sugar to make a vinaigrette for the
>shredded cabbage and potato and mixed greens salad I planned for
>dinner. With some shallots and home dried tomatoes in the salad
>dressing and some roasted pork on top, it was pretty good.

<happy sigh> Modom, I sho do love your writing. Are you and D coming
to the Albuquerque cook-in so I can die happy (many years hence,
hopefully....)

TammyM

On Thu, 02 Aug 2007 19:39:05 GMT, (TammyM) wrote:


><happy sigh> Modom, I sho do love your writing. Are you and D coming
>to the Albuquerque cook-in so I can die happy (many years hence,
>hopefully....)
>
>TammyM

Welcome back Tammy!!!! How are you recuperating?

I sure hope he is able to make it to the cook-in. Maybe we could do
a remoulade taste-off here too?

I am busy getting ready. Have veal breasts on order now, and will be
making a big vat of nice rich golden veal stock ...part of which will
be reduced down to demi-glace. And I am bottling my limoncello
today: it has been aging since last October.

Christine

Christine Dabney > wrote:
>I sure hope he is able to make it to the cook-in. Maybe we could do
>a remoulade taste-off here too?

Aieee! No!

Save it as impetus for the N'awlins cook-in!

>I am busy getting ready. Have veal breasts on order now, and will be
>making a big vat of nice rich golden veal stock ...part of which will
>be reduced down to demi-glace. And I am bottling my limoncello
>today: it has been aging since last October.

I'm gonna be soooo bummed I'm gonna have missed it.

--Blair

On Fri, 03 Aug 2007 03:40:50 GMT, Blair P. Houghton > wrote:


>>I am busy getting ready. Have veal breasts on order now, and will be
>>making a big vat of nice rich golden veal stock ...part of which will
>>be reduced down to demi-glace. And I am bottling my limoncello
>>today: it has been aging since last October.
>
>I'm gonna be soooo bummed I'm gonna have missed it.
>
> --Blair

You can't join us for this?

Christine

Donald Martinich wrote:
> Hello Modom,
>
> Thanks for the excellent reviews of your recent research. It serves
> as a fine example of a post! Maybe next time, we can talk you into
> researching po'boys or muffalettas. Or, even andouille and boudin; I'm
> thinking of Johnson's Grocery in Eunice, LA.
>
Ah, I *love* boudin! I can occasionally find it in the grocery store where
I shop (Schuck's) in the Memphis, TN area. Andouille has become almost as
easy to find up here as Italian sausage in NY or Bratwurst in WI. (Of
course, I can find Italian sausage and Bratwurst easily here since those are
more well known than Andouille or Chaurice.)

Jill

> You wrote:
>
>> This left us in a quandary. Was it rmoulade or wasn't it? What
>> constitutes the limit case for a condiment? What does it mean when
>> somebody gives you a rmoulade substitute and you proceed to doctor it
>> as you are able under the circumstances to resemble the real thing?
>> How can we relate this state of affairs to the GRH in a meaningful
>> way?
>
> Recipes for items like remoulade, which have been around for a while,
> seem to generate lots of variation. From oil and mayonnaise based to
> catsup based, for example. I've got a recipe from the Caribbean Room
> at the Pontchartrain Hotel which calls for 2 gal. of catsup for a 5
> gal. batch. Yikes, that's 40% by volume. And as time goes on, menu
> adjectives are becoming more and more meaningless. For example
> something like "Chicken a la Scampi with an Alfredo/Sundried Tomato
> Dipping sauce". So who's going to draw the line? Do we need a Royal
> Academy of Menu Terminology? Registration of recipes? Sounds like a
> talk show topic...
>
> Thanks again,
> D.M.

On Aug 1, 12:56 am, "modom (palindrome guy)" > wrote:
> We have started.
>

Of course this discussion depends on what you mean by "remoulade." LOL

Galatoire's shrimp remoulade uses regular shrimp but cut into small
pieces. Cocktail shrimp pose no size issues, but may be deficient in
flavor. It's another dish that I end up sopping.

On Fri, 03 Aug 2007 07:47:05 -0700, stark >
wrote:

>On Aug 1, 12:56 am, "modom (palindrome guy)" > wrote:
>> We have started.
>>
>
>Of course this discussion depends on what you mean by "remoulade." LOL
>
Obviously. And I'm hesitant to prescribe a set of rémoulade
characteristics, except to aver that Mrs. Brown's rémoulade led me to
undestand the significance of the genre back in 1973 when she gave D
and me a sample of her stuff. If a joint offers me rémoulade, my
judgment of its quality always uses Mrs. Brown's condiment as a base
line for estimating rémoulade-iciousness.

Someplace around here I have her recipe. I'll look it up and post it
over the weekend. Mrs. Brown had a lovely rémoulade.

>Galatoire's shrimp remoulade uses regular shrimp but cut into small
>pieces. Cocktail shrimp pose no size issues, but may be deficient in
>flavor. It's another dish that I end up sopping.

Good points, all.
--

modom

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

On Thu, 02 Aug 2007 19:39:05 GMT, (TammyM) wrote:

>On Wed, 01 Aug 2007 00:56:25 -0500, "modom (palindrome guy)"
> wrote:
><remoulade odyssey omitted>
>>Back in Cow Hill at last (and with my sister on her way back to
>>Dallas), I sliced some of Benoit's andouille and fried it in some
>>olive oil in a pan and then deglazed with brown rice vinegar and added
>>some Dijon mustard and some sugar to make a vinaigrette for the
>>shredded cabbage and potato and mixed greens salad I planned for
>>dinner. With some shallots and home dried tomatoes in the salad
>>dressing and some roasted pork on top, it was pretty good.
>
><happy sigh> Modom, I sho do love your writing. Are you and D coming
>to the Albuquerque cook-in so I can die happy (many years hence,
>hopefully....)
>
I'm happy to please, but I'm almost certain D and I will be unable to
attend the cook-in. It'll occur at the beginning of the academic term
here, and I'll be much in demand as a
paramedic/firefighter/gopher/general troubleshooter at that time. I
hope for the best, but I anticipate people with flaming heads
abounding in my building.

It's happened before, anyway.
--

modom

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Christine Dabney > wrote:
>On Fri, 03 Aug 2007 03:40:50 GMT, Blair P. Houghton > wrote:
>
>
>>>I am busy getting ready. Have veal breasts on order now, and will be
>>>making a big vat of nice rich golden veal stock ...part of which will
>>>be reduced down to demi-glace. And I am bottling my limoncello
>>>today: it has been aging since last October.
>>
>>I'm gonna be soooo bummed I'm gonna have missed it.
>
>You can't join us for this?

Work work work.

It'd be bad karma to take vacation just a few days after
accepting a permanent position.

--Blair

On Sat, 04 Aug 2007 05:17:50 GMT, Blair P. Houghton > wrote:

>Christine Dabney > wrote:

>>You can't join us for this?
>
>Work work work.
>
>It'd be bad karma to take vacation just a few days after
>accepting a permanent position.
>
> --Blair

It's a holiday weekend. You should be able to join us. Or will you be
working then?

Christine

Christine Dabney > wrote:
>On Sat, 04 Aug 2007 05:17:50 GMT, Blair P. Houghton > wrote:
>>Christine Dabney > wrote:
>
>>>You can't join us for this?
>>
>>Work work work.
>>
>>It'd be bad karma to take vacation just a few days after
>>accepting a permanent position.
>
>It's a holiday weekend. You should be able to join us. Or will you be
>working then?

Probably. Schedule issues are piling up and we just got
word the customer wants to do a whole lot more just to
use up some budget...

--Blair