Pour the Original New Orleans Cocktail--The Sazerac

Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook includes everything New Orleans, including the city's most famous cocktails. Perhaps the oldest recipe among them is the Sazerac, a rye whiskey-based drink that is flavored with Peychaud's bitters and Herbsaint anisette liqueur on page 401.

Chuck Taggart of Gumbo Pages had this to say about the Sazerac experience:

This is an absolutely exquisite cocktail. As you sip it, you come across layer after layer of flavor -- the warmth and glowing burn of the rye, effused with the flavors of spice and honey, the bite of the bitters balanced with the sweetness of the sugar, with the subtle yet complex flavor of the anise underneath and the perfume of the lemon oil from the twist feel like a symphony inside your mouth. This is also a drink that warms up well, revealing even more flavors. Sip it very slowly. Savor it. Take your time with it.

In the 1830s, a Creole apothecary by the name of Antoine Amadie Peychaud came from the Caribbeans and set up his shop in the French Quarter. Using a family recipe, he created Peychaud bitters which he would dispense to his fellow citizens in a brandy-based beverage with a splash of water and some sugar. Many assume that the way the drink was served, in an egg cup called coquetier, led to the name cocktail, but Robert Hess of Spirit World in a post dated May 29, 2006, shoots down this theory, pointing out that the word "cocktail" had been in existence since at least 1803.

The drink quickly became a staple in the city's coffee houses (read: Bars). At Wikipedia, it's stated that in 1859, John Schiller opened the Sazerac Coffee House in the French Quarter. Schiller also had a sideline in the sales of a French cognac called Sazerac-de-forge et fils and he used this brandy with Peychaud's bitters. The drink eventually came to be known by the name of the coffee house where it was served.

The drink underwent a change in 1870. A gentleman by the name of Thomas Handy took over the Sazerac Coffee House. With changing tastes and a new difficulty in getting cognac, rye whiskey became the base of the drink. Handy formed the Sazerac Company as well, buying the Peychaud Family's bitters recipe along with the bar. An absinthe coating of the glass was introduced at this time as well, the final evolution of the drink we know today.

While Hurricanes are the drink most commonly associated with the city of New Orleans, Chuck Taggart observes that "Hurricanes are for tourists. Sazeracs are for natives." The Sazerac is viewed as the quintessential New Orleans cocktail and was under consideration for the title of official cocktail of the State of Louisiana. On April 10, 2008, The Daily Illini in a post from the AP newswire reported that an effort had been made by Senator Ed Murray to declare the drink the official state cocktail. Due to concerns of the state's image, the Louisiana State Senate voted the legislation down in a vote of 27-8.

While not officially recognized, the people of New Orleans hold the drink close to their hearts. Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook advises using Old Overholt rye whiskey in preparing the Sazerac.

Gumbo Pages: "The Original Sazerac Cocktail"
The Spirit World: "Sazerac" 05/29/06
Wikipedia: "Sazerac (cocktail)" 04/09/08
The Daily Illini: "Odds and Ends: Senate Rejects Bill Making Sazerac Official La. Cocktail" 04/10/08
photo courtesy of Lee Coursey, used under this Creative Commons license

Meet the Man Behind the Book: Ralph Brennan

According to his profile at the Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook website, Ralph Brennan is a third-generation restaurateur who entered the restaurant business after a stint as a CPA for Price Waterhouse and Company. It's stated that his grandfather, Owen Edward Brennan, opened the first of the family's many restaurants in 1947, which quickly became a popular eatery of the French Quarter scene. Since that time, the Brennan Family legacy of fine food has only increased, composing 12 restaurants owned by different branches of the family. Among Ralph's restaurants are Bacco, Ralph's on the Park, Red Fish Grill and Disneyland's Ralph Brennan's Jazz Kitchen. He also co-owns Mr. B's Bistro, Commander's Palace and Brennan's of Houston.

His love of fine food has garnered Ralph the laurels of success. Among his many awards are the The International Foodservice Manufacturers Association's Gold Plate Operator of the Year for 2004 as well as his 2005 induction into the Louisiana Restaurant Association's Hall of Fame. But along with his love of food is his love of the city he calls home: New Orleans. He chooses to open restaurants in historic structures which are lovingly renovated. Among them are Ralph's on the Park which is located in a structure identified as the first concession stand opened at City Park in 1860 and Commander's Palace which has been a restaurant since 1880.

His current project, Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook, has been garnering rave reviews. Ironically, this book may never have happened had Ralph not had his first oyster as a teenager. With his father very allergic to seafood, Ralph was raised on a diet of steaks and potatoes. In a piece at NOLA.com by Judy Walker, he states:

"I was in high school when some older guys invited me to play golf with them," Brennan said. After their round they went to Bozo's, where a couple of beers helped the first oyster, perched on a cracker, go down." I said 'That isn't bad,' and had a couple more," he said.

The spark of inspiration for a cookbook was lit when Charlee Williamson, VP of Ralph Brennan's Restaurant Group, overheard food writer John Mariani comment that the definitive seafood cookbook has yet to be done. At neworleanscitybusiness.com in an article by Emilie Bahr, Ralph states the idea floated around in his head for about five years before he began to bring together his team of talent for the project. Originally projected to take about two years, the project took four, largely due to Hurricane Katrina. He had this to say about his cookbook:

“What makes this different is it’s not just a restaurant cookbook,” Brennan said. “I think it will have a broader appeal. We also wanted to make a statement. Seafood is very, very important to our cuisines here, to the people that live here.”

Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook: "Ralph Brennan and The Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group" 2008
NOLA.com: "Seafood city: New Orleans Recipes Abound in Ralph Brennan's Cookbook" 04/17/08
New Orleans City Business: "Ralph Brennan Serves Up Seafood Cookbook" 04/08/08

Photo by Kerri McCaffety. Copyright by The Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Potatoes Pontalba

With New Orleans chefs' tendency to commemorate great events and important personages, it's not surprising that the Baroness Micaela Almonester Pontalba numbers among those so remembered. On page 341 of Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook in the "Accompaniments, Etc." chapter, the Baroness receives her due. Potatoes Pontalba is a homey, comfort-food dish made with cubed potatoes, onion, garlic and tasso (a spicy, dry-cured ham traditional in Cajun cooking) and makes a wonderful side dish to the main courses featured in the cookbook.

At FrenchQuarter.com, it's stated that Micaela Almonester, born in 1795, was the daughter of a genteelly poor Creole mother and Spanish-born father by the name of Andres Almonestera y Roxas. Roxas established a large fortune in New Orleans during the late 1700s and contributed large sums of money to establish today's St. Louis Cathedral, the Cabildo and the Presbytere. He also left his daughter the land bordering Jackson Square where Micaela built the Pontalba buildings during the later 1840s. The buildings were a sensation, both for their beauty and utility as well as being built by a woman at the center of a notorious scandal.

At the age of 15, Micaela married a French cousin by the name of Clestin de Pontalba and moved to France. A New York Times article written August 31, 1997, by Angeline Goreau tells the tale of a troubled marriage complete with meddling in-laws, greed and violence. Her in-laws' constant maneuvering to take control of her finances finally exploded into violence and scandal October 19, 1834:

". . . on the morning of Oct. 19, the 80-year-old Baron de Pontalba, dueling pistols in hand, burst into the sleeping quarters of his 40-year-old daughter-in-law (the future Baroness de Pontalba) and fired three shots into her chest. Perceiving that she was wounded but not yet dead, he pursued her through several rooms of their country estate, repeatedly shooting - but missing. Finally, he gave up, rewrote his will in favor of a military school and killed himself."

The murder attempt eventually led to the Baroness' separation and she returned to New Orleans. Bill Thayer's website has an article from the Louisiana Historical Quarterly by Henry Renshaw that details the Baroness' quest to build the Pontalba buildings on the land inherited from her father. Emphasizing her family's ties to Jackson Square is the fact that the Battle of New Orleans was fought on her uncle Ignace Delino de Chalmette's plantation.

After completing the buildings, she returned to France and (eventually) her husband, dying at the age of 78 in 1874.

FrenchQuarter.com: "Micaela Almonester Pontalba: The Baroness of Extremes " 2006
New York Times: "A Spectacular Mess of a Marriage" 08/31/97
Bill Thayer's Website: "Jackson Square by Henry Renshaw"
photo courtesy of David Paul Ohmer, used under this Creative Commons license

Mix Up A Ramos Gin Fizz with Ralph Brennan

In the Spirits chapter of Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook, it's stated on page 400:

"It should be a given that New Orleans has a very old acquaintance with liquor, in light of its having been the country's favorite party town as long as anybody can remember. . . What is certain is that New Orleans has produced more than its share of famous cocktails over the last century and a half, the gin fizz, the Sazerac and the hurricane among them."

The Gin Fizz, a concoction featuring cream, egg white, and orange flower water, is a genuine New Orleans phenomenon. It was even referred to as a New Orleans Fizz up north at the height of its popularity during the 1910s. Chuck Taggart of Gumbo Pages tells of former Louisiana Governor Huey P. Long and his affection for the beverage, which drove him to bring along the New Orleans Roosevelt Hotel bartender to the New York Roosevelt in order to enjoy the creamy, floral-flavored beverage. The trade name of "Ramos" was acquired by the Hotel Roosevelt after Prohibition was repealed.

Liquoranddrink.com has an excellent short history on the Ramos Gin Fizz taken from New Orleans Drinks and How To Mix 'Em by Stanley C. Arthur. An enterprising bartender named Henry C. Ramos came to the city of New Orleans by way of Baton Rouge and introduced his signature drink in 1888 after purchasing the Imperial Cabinet Saloon located at Gravier and Carondelet. Upstairs was a restaurant called The Old Hickory, where Ramos mixed up his soon-to-be famous beverage.

Ramos and his drink really broke into the mainstream after his purchase of the infamous Tom Anderson saloon, The Stag, in 1907. At the height of its popularity, 35 shaker boys were employed at the saloon in 1915 for Mardi Gras and were unable to keep up with the demand. At Cocktailchronicles.com, Paul Clarke posted a history of the Ramos Gin Fizz dated September 11, 2005. Ramos kept his very popular drink mix a secret, but when Prohibition and the Volstead Act was enacted on January 16, 1920, it is surmised that he revealed the recipe to the world as an act of civil disobedience, hoping to inspire the home mixologist.

Ramos is to be thanked for two reasons. First, for creating such an excellent beverage and secondly, for sharing it with the world, ensuring its survival for the past 110 years. And thanks to Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook, the home chef can prepare a piece of New Orleans history.

SOURCE: "The Original Ramos Gin Fizz"
SOURCE: "Ramos Gin Fizz"
SOURCE: "In Praise of Difficult Drinks, Part I: The Ramos Gin Fizz" 09/11/05
Photo by Kerri McCaffety. Copyright by The Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Jazzy Jambalaya

Jambalaya is yet another characteristic dish of New Orleans. Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook features a creole version of the dish made with andouille sausage, pickled pork or ham and shrimp on page 266. The book states that Jambalaya is one of the oldest of creole recipes. The dish seems to share origins between paellas, which are of Spanish origin, and traditional African rice dishes. Etymologically, the word Jambalaya is a combination of French and African Bantu terms. The French jambon means "ham", while the Bantu word "ya-ya" means rice.

Creole Jambalaya, as opposed to the Cajun version which does not feature tomatoes, originated in New Orleans' French Quarter according to Wikipedia. It evolved from Spanish paellas. A key spice in paellas, saffron, was difficult to acquire in the early days of the city due to the high cost of importing the spice from abroad. Creatively challenged, cooks began to substitute tomatoes, creating the dish we know today. The first printed reference to the word dates to 1872 while the 1909 edition of The Picayune's Creole Cookbook identifies the dish being of Spanish-Creole origin.

About.com, in an article by Diana Rattray, offers an alternate explanation to the origins of the dish with this colorful story taken from The Dictionary of American Food and Drink:

A gentleman stopped by a New Orleans inn late one night to find nothing left for him to dine upon. The owner thereupon told the cook, whose name was Jean, to "mix some things together" --balayez, in the dialect of Louisiana -- so the grateful guest pronounced the dish of odds-and-ends wonderful and named it "Jean Balayez.

In Gonzales, Louisiana, a gentleman by the name of Steve Juneau developed the idea of naming the city the "Jambalaya Capitol in the World" with an accompanying annual festival in order to promote the city. The city's title was confirmed in 1968 by Governor John J. McKeithen. Held over Memorial Day weekend, the festival's main event is the Jambalaya Cooking Contest. Other activities include a carnival, live music, car show and the crowning of the Jambalaya King and Queen.

SOURCE: "Jambalaya" 03/31/08
SOURCE: "Southern Food: Jambalaya"
SOURCE: "The Jambalaya Festival" 2008
photo courtesy of MetalCowboy, used under this Creative Commons license

Introducing the Ubiquitous New Orleans Poor Boy

Whenever a visitor arrives in our fair city on the crescent, it's almost inevitable that at one point or another, a poor boy is ordered by the hungry traveler. And its the only sandwich that "dresses" for the occasion, usually with iceberg lettuce, tomato slices and mayonnaise along with the diner's choice of filling, ranging from beef to ham and even french fries. Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook features a poor boy recipe on page 256 filled with fried oysters.

FrenchQuarter.com presents a story by Ian McNulty of the origins of the poor boy. In the 1920s, two brothers and former street car conductors, Clovis and Benjamin Martin, opened a restaurant on St. Claude Avenue. In 1929, the city's street car conductors went on a four-month strike. Taking on the cause as their own, the Martin brothers began to feed the strikers from the back of their restaurant, creating an inexpensive sandwich made of bits of roast beef slathered with gravy. When a striker would arrive, the call would go through the kitchen, "Here comes another poor boy!" Over time, the sandwich became known as a poor boy.

Wikipedia presents other stories of the origin of the sandwich, one of which comes from Jay Harlow's The Art of the Sandwich. According to Harlow, the term stems from the French phrase, pour boire, which means peace offering and referred to the sandwiches men would bring home to their wives after a late night on the town.

Wikipedia also correctly identifies the importance of the proper bread in order to have a genuine poor boy sandwich:

A key ingredient that differentiates po' boys from subs, gyros and grinders is the bread. Louisiana French bread is different from the traditional baguette, in that it has a flaky crust with a soft, airy center. . . The crust of Louisiana French bread is very crispy--so much so that it is difficult to eat without leaving crumbs. But the interior is very light and airy, often less dense than regular white bread.

The sandwich is considered such an important part of New Orleans' culture that a festival has been created to celebrate it called the New Orleans Po-Boy Preservation Festival. Part of the festival is the collection of stories about the poor boy. In a question emphasizing the importance of the bread to an authentic poor boy is, "How far away from NOLA have you encountered po-boys (and how bad were they without authentic New Orleans French Bread)?"

SOURCE: "New Orleans' Po-Boy Is A Rich Food Tradition"
SOURCE: "Po' Boy" 03/30/08
SOURCE: "Share Your Po-Boy Story"
photo courtesy of Jef Poskanzer, used under this Creative Commons license

Gumbo Is Delicious

Ralph Brennan's New Orleans Seafood Cookbook features four gumbo recipes for the home gourmet to prepare. In the book, it's stated on page 110 that "The chances of two Louisiana cooks coming up with gumbos that are exactly alike are about the same as the New Orleans Saints football team winning two Super Bowls in succession." Its a wonderful recipe that allows for adaptation and improvisation, permitting the cook to use virtually any kind of meat or seafood in its preparation. Mark W. Huntsman states that written reference has been found where owl, muskrat and even squirrel has been used in gumbo.

Both Ralph Brennan and Huntsman contends that the dish is of West African descent. Huntsman states:

Although the French contributed the concept of the roux and the Choctaw invented filé powder, the modern soup is overwhelmingly West African in character. Not only does it resemble many of the okra-based soups found in contemporary Senegal, the name of the soup its self is derived from the Bantu words for the okra contained within (guingombo, tchingombo, or kingombo. A legacy of the colonial era, the modern French word for okra is quite simply “gombo”).

Gumbo is in fact named for one of its principle ingredients, okra. The Food Reference Website explains that the word is Bantu in origin and is in fact one of the few words that have entered the English language via the transmission of the African slave population. Ralph Brennan states in his cookbook that the recipe has been around over 200 years. According to Stanley Dry, Dr. Carl A. Brasseaux of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette discovered the first written reference to gumbo in 1803 in New Orleans. The dish was prepared for a gubernatorial reception.

Dry probably captures gumbo's appeal for cooks best when he states that, "part of Gumbo's virtue, apart from its deliciousness, is that the dish is very forgiving of the cook. . . ingredients may be changed to use what is on hand."

SOURCE: "History of Gumbo"
SOURCE: "Gumbo"
SOURCE: "A Short History of Gumbo"
Photo by Kerri McCaffety. Copyright by The Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.