We spent last week with Jeff and Jackie Meyerson, Maggie Mason, Beth Fedyn and Wilba Swearingen in New Orleans. We stayed in a strategically located Marriott Residence Inn on St. Jospeh’s Street. The highlight of our visit was a Sunday trip to Slidell where Deb and John put on a fabulous feast for us: BBQ, brisket, Pina Colada chicken, fish, spicy slaw, potato salad, fruit salad, yummy rolls, and plenty of drink choices. Jackie brought cheesecake from New York City for dessert. Everyone enjoyed the food and fun conversation!
On Monday, we and the Meyersons had lunch at Mother’s Restaurant. Real New Orleans food! Later, Diane and I met up with our niece–the CSI forensic investigator who works in Slidell–and her husband at Emeril’s restaurant (just one block away from our hotel). Once again, the food was outstanding! Diane and I both went with the pork chop. For dessert, Diane chose the wonderful Banana Cream Pie (Diane said afterword it was the best Banana Cream Pie she ever tasted!). I went with Emeril’s signature dessert: Chocolate Soufflé. Super yummy!
On Tuesday, we visited the World War II Museum (just a couple blocks from our hotel). Diane’s father fought in Europe during WWII and my father served on a destroyer in the Pacific. We found the various exhibits and film of the battlefields riveting. After about three hours, we departed the Museum but we’ll return to see more the next time we visit New Orleans.
On Wednesday, we flew from New Orleans to Orlando (where it was 84 degrees). Our flight from Orlando to Buffalo was bumpy. When we landed in Buffalo, the temperature was 30 degrees. Later that night, we were hit with a couple of inches of snow. Big difference from New Orleans and Orlando! We had a lot of fun with our friends and family. Jeff and Jackie coordinated the trip to Deb’s house and rented a huge vehicle that would carry all seven of us. Thanks, Jeff & Jackie!
The food looks good, congratulations!
I read about the loads of snow in the Northeast – NYC was also hit:
The Port Authority bus terminal was partially closed, people had to wait for hours.
So going to the South over the weekend was a good decision, george!
Sorry, of course it wasn’t the weekend – seems I’m not really awake yet, here in Hungary it’s also getting really cold, last week we had almost summer temperatures.
Wolf, we might get a brief warmup in temperatures for Thanksgiving. But the Winter outlook is: cold.
Wolf, New Orleans was a lot warmer than Western NY. Yes, I’d say our timing was good!
So what did you bring back for the rest of us? T-shirts? Shrunken heads? Hush puppies?
Dan, I have electronic dogtags from the World War II Museum. Very cool.
The gator is in the mail, Dan.
Yes, we had a great time despite the iffy weather (George can tell you about the Day of Rain), which got much colder after George and Diane left, and only warmed up on Friday, the day we went home. AS George said, the highlight was the barbecue at Deb and John’s home in Slidell. John got up at 1 am to start the smoker for the brisket and pulled pork. Now that was above and beyond the call of duty!
Top picture from left: Deb’s daughter Victoria, Maggie (partly hidden), Diane, George, Jackie, Deb (standing), Jeff, Beth, Wilba (mostly hidden), Deb’s daughter Lily, Lily’s friend whose name I forgot, sorry. Not in the picture: John,busy with the food, and Victoria’s boyfriend Colin, who I think was behind the camera.
Jeff, John firing up the smoker at 1 A.M. and Deb’s fabulous variety of food shows how incredible our friends are! And, of course, you and Jackie getting us to Slidell in that tank deserves a prize, too!
CORRECTION: I missed John at the bottom right of the picture! Sorry, John.
We had a great time—good company, good food, endless flow of conversation: what’s not to like? We were sorry our other daughter Julia could not be with us, along with Patti & Phil (it was through Patti’s blog that I initially connected with everyone a decade or so ago); and we took a moment to remember our dear departed friend, Bill Crider. Anyway, we had a great time…and we ate leftover bbq all week and finally polished everything off on Friday!
Deb, your spread looked like Food for Fifty! Many of your food options are not readily available here in Western NY (I’ve never seen Pina Colada Chicken on a menu up here). And your delicious Spicy Slaw far excels the wimpy slaw in this area!
The highlight for Jackie was the picture of Emeril serving you personally.
Jeff, it’s a little known secret that Emeril and I are good buddies. We both love food!
What a wonderful trip, and so nice of Deb to invite you all.
Weather: the sun is shining though it’s only 44 and windy. It’ll be about 50 today, and stay like this through Wednesday. Thursday is rain, continuing through Tuesday, and it will warm to the low 60s. The Fall color is still nice, though the leaves are falling fast in this wind. Sadly, we are about 5 inches behind on rain, and if we don’t get it and a good snowpack this Winter, we’ll be in drought by May. Come on, rain!
Rick, we’re experiencing snow showers right now with the temps hovering around freezing. Fortunately, we aren’t going anywhere today. The Buffalo Bills have a Bye Week so we might watch some of the other NFL teams. We especially want to see if the New Orleans Saints can take down last year’s Super Bowl Winners, the Philadelphia Eagles this afternoon!
We were thinking of going out to eat on Thursday since, like George, we had no food in the house after the trip. We went as far as making plans until we heard the weather: low 40s during the week, dropping to a high of 31 on Thursday. So now we’re going shopping for Thursday dinner.
We saw a bunch of Eagles fans in the Riverwalk before we left on Friday. I’m looking forward to the Saints-Falcons game on Thursday.
Jeff, we ate out last night with friends at an Italian restaurant. The meatballs are the size of softballs! I also enjoyed the stuffed banana peppers! Very hot!
Jackie is still frustrated that no one left her a taste of the chocolate blackout cake after she bought it and carried it from New York.
Jeff, Jackie should send you out to buy a replacement chocolate blackout cake RIGHT NOW!
Oh Jackie—I’m so sorry! I should have put a wedge aside for you. It went awfully fast. And the cheesecake was some of the best I’ve ever had—light and creamy, not cloying like some cheesecake can be; it tasted as if they might use marscapone cheese along with cream cheese in their recipe.
Eating at home with friends and/or family is still one of my favourites!
This summer we had my wife’s nephew, his wife and children from the USA here in Hungary (he’s a prof in Nashville) and I made some Mexican stuff – including my favourite “Gringo Guacamole” 🙂
PS:
George, what kind of drinks did you have with your food – looks like beer to me …
Wolf, I drank Diet Coke.
It’s looking good for the Saints, as both Carolina and Atlanta lost today. And break up the Giants! They won their second straight game.
Jeff, the Giants were cruising and then Tampa Bay came back to give them a scare. I was flipping between the Giant game and the Steelers vs. Jaguars game. The Jags had a 16-0 lead…and lost! The Buffalo Bills play the Jaguars next week.