A Decadent Food Weekend: Part 1, Lunch at Cafe Degas

By happy coincidence, our daughter, who lives uptown in New Orleans, was out of town the weekend before we returned to our teaching jobs, and she offered us the use of her apartment so we could indulge in some great New Orleans eating (and a little bit of sight-seeing.)  Indulge we did!  Here, in 3 separate posts, are the restaurants we visited.

We began with a late lunch at Café Degas (3127 Esplanade Ave.) We had planned on eating light, but, as so often happens in New Orleans, those good intentions failed.

In fact, those good intentions crashed and burned immediately when we ordered an appetizer called “L’Assiette de Patés” which consisted of two incredibly rich house-made patés—a beef and a pork--and a beef-pork saucisson or sausage. Served with crusty baguette slices, these meat elements were joined on the plate by cornichons, dried figs and a fig mustard that had a great horseradish hit.   The only amount of restraint we showed at this point was in ordering a plate version of this dish instead of the larger board version.

For his lunch entrée, my husband ordered one of his favorite dishes, moules.  Café Degas’s spin on this classic French mussel dish is called “Les Moules au Fenouil," and they serve their mussels, steamed in white wine, on a bed of cooked fennel garnished with fennel fronds.  I didn’t actually get to try a mussel (ahem!), but I can vouch for the wonderful French fries, the traditional moules side dish.

I ordered “La Salade de Chèvre Tiède”  which consisted of roasted beets, Granny Smith apple slices, and toasted walnuts on an arugula salad.  Lightly dressed with a balsamic vinaigrette, the salad also featured two “warm goat cheese croutons” as they were called on the menu.  These croutons were the only weak note of the salad, as they weren’t particularly warm and were essentially crisped baguette slices smeared with goat cheese (which didn’t taste remarkably different from cream cheese).

When we ordered dessert, we salved our consciences by ordering the relatively light “île flotantte” (floating islands) which are soft meringues resting on a puddle of crème anglaise (vanilla custard.)  The “iles” were garnished with blueberries and a particularly good caramel sauce drizzle.  It was hard to restrain ourselves from licking the bowl.

Apart from the delicious food, we also loved the great location and charmingly funky atmosphere of Café Degas.  Away from the hubbub and parking nightmares of the French Quarter, Café Degas is easily accessible and on-street parking is a snap.

As you enter, a deck for outside seating is to the left. Surprisingly the inside seating, to the right, doesn’t look much different as there is a tree growing through the dining room, and the walls are sheets of clear plastic.  Since the plastic is not attached to the wall frames, I assume maybe these are rolled up in temperate weather.  But the room was surprisingly cool on this hot, humid day.

The very friendly wait staff consisted mostly of women, and tattoos seemed to be a job requirement.  But I observed something I’ve never seen in a restaurant.  As the lunch service was coming to a close and only a few customers remained, a small buffet was set up in the dining room, and the wait staff and kitchen crew sat down together in the dining room for lunch.  I am sure that goes a long way in building employee camaraderie and loyalty.

Café Degas calls itself, on its website, “The longest running and most Gallic French Bistro in New Orleans.” I can’t verify either of those claims, but we had a deliciously decadent lunch there, and I highly recommend it!