Of Po-Boy Love

A little over a year ago, Hurricane Gustav blew through our way.  Nick and I rode out the storm in his apartment and were fortunate enough only to lose power for around four days.  We actually had kind of a grand time; the city near deserted, dark and quiet at night, nothing to do but amuse ourselves.  Still, it was a hot four days, so we also listened keenly to radio announcements regarding establishments that were open (which meant they had generators and, usually, a/c of some sort) - places serving food, or drinks or offering internet.  We spent one long afternoon in a tiny neighborhood bar called Brothers Three that was packed to the gills.  We shared drinks with a couple who worked at a nearby diner that had also remained open.  The male portion of the couple soon grew astonishingly drunk and surly and kind of clouded over the good time we had all been having.  The following day Nick and I didn't want to risk running into this unpleasant individual again, so we drove across town to a little bar/cafe called the Night Hawk, which was rumored to have internet.  We set up shop in a booth, read books, caught up via email with friends and relatives who wondered about our well-being, ordered two coffees, and two sublime french fry po-boys.



French fry po-boys are not particularly difficult to find in New Orleans, but what set these apart is that they were smothered in absolutely delicious vegan gravy (and southern food made vegan-friendly is particularly difficult to find in New Orleans). We would talk about these po-boys for months to come, but we seldom went to the Marigny, the neighborhood lucky enough to possess the Night Hawk.  Flash forward to April 2009, Nick and I found our first apartment together in the Marigny and promptly began fantasizing about the Night Hawk's french fry po-boys.  And then...tragedy!  The Night Hawk succumbed to one scourge of restaurants or another - whether mismanagement or some other woe, I know not - and closed.


We discovered this terrible news some months ago, but just recently I decided the time was nigh for us to console ourselves by creating our own gravy-laden french fry po-boys.  And we did.  And they were good.

We (a) put on some Radio Lab.  In case you aren't familiar, it's a thought-provoking and extremely entertaining radio show out of New York.  It's also in my list of links on this very blog, so check it out.  

(b) I cut some Leidenheimer french loaves in twain.  I don't know that Leidenheimer bread is available outside of New Orleans, but just make sure your bread is chewy and crusty so it can stand up to the drenching of gravy you're going to give it.

(c) We like our po-boys "dressed", as they say, so Nick sliced up a plate of fixins - lettuce, onions, tomato.


(d) Sometime in here, I threw some frozen french fries in the toaster oven to bake.  NB: We used thick cut crinkle fries, but I would recommend slim shoe strings for a truly excellent po-boy.  We're definitely going that way next time.

(e)  I sliced and sauteed crimini mushrooms while Nick concocted golden gravy.  He found this recipe in a cookbook called Table for Two by Joanne Stepaniak.  This is an especially fantastic vegan cookbook for sauce and faux cheese recipes.  They are simple and extremely tasty.  The golden gravy calls for flour, nutritional yeast, veggie broth (we use homemade broth, which really gives it a complexity of flavor that is hard to get in meatless gravies), soy sauce, oil and some onion granules.  We've found sauteed mushrooms to be a nice addition. And,


(f)  We assembled his and hers.

As I mentioned, in the future I'll be using skinny fries, but I have no real complaints.  We ate the heck out of them.