Minh-City Cafe

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One of my research adventures took place at Cafe Minh. It is located in what used to be Michael’s Mid-City Grill before the storm. When the latter restaurant did not re-open Post-Katrina, Chef Minh Bui decided that it would be a fitting abode for his Cafe Minh.

With his roots in Vietnam, Chef Minh got his New Orleans start cooking at places such as Emeril’s and Commander’s Palace. After mastering his skills, he developed a Vietnamese-French fusion cuisine that contains hints of local Creole cooking. His first restaurant Lemongrass was opened next to Angelo Brocato’s on Carrollton Avenue. A second location of Lemongrass located in the International House hotel was opened, and a third restaurant called 56 Degrees was also opened in the Whitney Hotel. Before Katrina, both the Carrollton location and 56 Degrees closed. After the storm, Chef Minh decided he wanted to return to Mid-City and opened Cafe Minh at its current location.

Cafe Minh fits perfectly in the Restaurant Row even though it is not physically in line with the others. About a block into Canal Street, it is still in close walking distance of the area, however. One thing we can recognize about the Restaurant Row is that even though there may be similar types of food (for instance, Wit’s Inn, Venezia, Theo’s, Papa John’s and Domino’s all have pizza), there is still enough variety throughout the restaurants that they are all able to survive. Among the Asian restaurants, you may find that Little Tokyo, Doson’s Noodle House, Yummy Yummy, and even Cafe Minh have similar items on the menu. Yet because of the creativity of the chefs, the different environments of the restaurants themselves, and the specific cravings of those searching out food, co-existing is not a problem for these places.

Another similarity I have noticed between the Asian restaurants is that the owners or head chefs all learned to cook in their birth countries. This seems to come full circle as they originally learn to cook in the authentic way of their birthplace, then they end up drifting into another type of cuisine (whether it be another Asian cuisine or something completely different), and in the end, they come back to their original style of cooking, adding a bit of their own flair. That little bit of flair and originality is what sets each of these restaurants apart from the other.

During my visit, I discovered that the food at Cafe Minh is excellent, however, when one typically thinks of the item he or she is ordering, one might not get exactly what they are expecting. For instance, when I ordered the fried eggplant, I did not expect it to be topped with mozzarella, on top of tomatoes, on top of a bed of lettuce, on top of toast. It was amazing nonetheless. This is an example of Chef Minh’s genius at work.

For dessert I had the white chocolate raspberry cheesecake, and it was divine. Colorful and divine.

Also, while visiting Cafe Minh, I immediately noticed all of the artwork on the walls. With the high ceilings and ambient lighting, I almost felt that I was in an art gallery for a moment. The bartender even told me that the artwork is rotated by several local artists throughout the year.

When wandering Mid-City and you find yourself wanting something different than the norm, try stopping by Cafe Minh. If anything, the experience is one you’re unlikely to find anywhere else on Restaurant Row.

Restaurant Criticism

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I wrote recently that I would not engage in any restaurant criticism here.  And I won’t.  But an essential part of our research is figuring out where the restaurants—past and present—of our restaurant row fit within the complex New Orleans culinary universe.  To that end, I have spent many hours lately digging around in old newspapers, magazines, guidebooks, newsletters, etc. to see how the restaurants have been evaluated over time.

Since the late 1960s, restaurant critics have played an important role in shaping discussions about restaurants and dining in New Orleans.  For this project, I am looking mostly at material about our neighborhood, written and published locally.  This is simply a way of making a very large amount of material more manageable.  For another project, I am also looking into restaurant writing about New Orleans more generally, including some of the early efforts to legitimize the genre and the way it has changed over time, as the idea of culture, useful criticism, careers and other factors have come into focus.

1973 Edition of The New Orleans Underground Gourmet

Many people in New Orleans would agree that Richard Collin, author of the “New Orleans Underground Gourmet” (1970, Simon and Schuster), was the city’s first real restaurant critic.  He was also a history professor at UNO, where his work in food writing was not terribly well respected, both because it was not really academic work and because it probably did not seem like appropriate behavior for a scholar.  UNO would look on such things differently today.  That said, there is a relatively clear relationship between art, film and literary criticism and scholarship in related fields, so that it does not seem unusual for professors to write analytic as well as critical pieces for both scholarly and popular publications.  The ties between academe and restaurant criticism are less obvious, at least from a disciplinary standpoint.  Especially for a historian such as Collin.

Collin stirred up quite a bit of controversy with his writing, in the various editions of “The New Orleans Underground Gourmet,” in his columns for New Orleans States-Item, and in a few other guidebooks about the city.  His reviews were subject to protest at a meeting of New Orleans restaurateurs in 1975, with accusations that he lacked objectivity and, worse, that his wife, Rima Collin (also a UNO professor), had a professional interest in seeing some restaurants better rated than others.  These kinds of accusations and debates go with the territory, as Frank Bruni, former New York Times restaurant critic, notes in his recent book “Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater” (2009, Penguin). But the tone of the original confrontation with Collin seems to suggest that in the early 1970s, restaurateurs had not yet figured out how to make sense—and use—of restaurant writing.

However, it is also true that Collin, along with other critics in the early years of restaurant writing, did not hesitate to dole out cruel commentary on restaurants.  Although such commentary still exists, many restaurant writers in New Orleans tend these days to only write about restaurants they can say nice things about, ignoring the rest.  The reasons behind this are not entirely clear.  Perhaps they feel they can leave the harsh comments to blog writers, on-line discussion boards like Urban Spoon, Yelp, Chowhound, etc.  Collin, however, left us with some very amusing evaluations of restaurants in our neighborhood.  Some include restaurants that have since become veritable institutions in New Orleans, which suggests that despite restaurateurs fear, it is possible to survive and even thrive despite the critical barbs tossed out by food writers.  Here are a few pithy comments about defunct restaurants in our neighborhood:

On Hazel’s Po-Boy, 208 N. Carrollton (where Taqueria Guerrero Mexico is today): “Hazel’s serves cheap poor boys that lack distinction, as well as luncheon specials on paper plates.” (“The New Orleans Underground Gourmet,” 1973, p. 132.)

On Mid City Kitchen, 303 N. Carrollton (near the corner of Bienville and N. Carrollton, on the site of a defunct strip mall, unreconstructed since Katrina): “On some days this is one of the great places in town. On most days it isn’t.  Inconsistency mars the record of a brilliant Cajun burger, well seasoned hamburger poor boys, and excellent roast beef poor boys.  On the bad days you wouldn’t recognize them.” (“The New Orleans Restaurant Guide,” 1976, with Rima Collin, p. 165.)

All, of course, is not negative.  Collin waxed poetic about many restaurants.  In 1976, he wrote about Mandina’s “This is what good old New Orleans neighborhood restaurants once looked like.  Mandina’s still does.  A joy to look at and a joy to eat in.” (“The New Orleans Restaurant Guide,” 1976, with Rima Collin, p. 108).

Some evaluations change over time.  But one that stays remarkably consistent is Brocato’s, which Collin and every other critic I have come across has proclaimed magical.  He writes that the cannoli “may well be the cheapest miracle in the world.” (“The New Orleans Restaurant Guide,” 1976, with Rima Collin, p. 72.)  And despite my promise not to engage in any criticism myself, I will admit that I believe that this is still true, 34 years later.

Much can be learned from looking at the way restaurant writing has shaped our restaurants and our way of thinking about restaurants.  Please let us know of any memories you have about restaurant writing, encounters with critics or ideas about how it should be done.  Who are you favorite (and least favorite) critics?  Tell us about them.