Confessions at Cochon

I am a fledgling foodie. I proved it tonight while we were eating at the restaurant I've been dreaming of eating at ever since I knew we were going to New Orleans...Cochon. Yes. It means Pig in French, and "real" foodies can see the fun play on words and the cultural spin that these clever chefs have used in creating this amazing place. I'm still just embarassed that I'm so infatuated with a restaurant called pig in French.

After a rather long and challenging decision process that involved a bunch of questions like which is your favorite? Which do you prefer the blue crab or the oysters? I think it's hilarious how much I look for the approval of the wait person in my decision. But I figure that my waitperson is the closest source to the impossible "right" choices I need to make. All of the questions are based on the painful, first world problem that I can't have a little bit of EVERYTHING on the amazing menu. 

But at last John and I decide on a dinner order. We choose braised pork cheeks, blue crab, bacon and satsuma salad with a jonny cake, fried livers with pepper jelly and toast, Lima beans ( yes, and they were amazing) and creamy grits. Now that seems like so little when I remember all the choices on the menu. 

As we wait for our food to come I enjoy a cocktail made with the juice of satsuma. Again, John "the food reductionist" translates the juice of a satsuma to orange juice. First he calls beignets donuts and now he's calling satsumas oranges. I did save myself from eating crow again though. He made light of the fact that satsumas were just Japanese oranges and although I was appalled that he would reduce an exotic food like satsuma to a simple food like orange, I did some research and alas, satsuma is a "large domain on the southern Japanese island of Kyushu, dominated in the Edo period by the great samurai clan of Shimazu" but in my reality it is the idyllic fruit that Truman Capote shared with his best friend in "A Christmas Memory". I'm working on forgiving John for this transgression.

It became a lot easier to forgive him after he had the BRILLIANT idea of asking for more bread so that we could sop up all the deliciousness on the plates without me having to embarass myself and lick the plates, which I was truly on the verge of doing.

The final angst filled decision of the evening was dessert. John and I agreed (with some guilt laden discussion) to "share" it. We couldn't agree on the chocolate mousse cake, the Meyer lemon farmers cheese tart or the gingerbread pudding with rum raisin ice cream, so I sought out the advice of our waitperson again and I was shocked and delighted when her response was "I will surprise you!". So we waited on pins and needles until the Meyer lemon dessert appeared before us. She had made a very thoughtful decision...I hope:/

But, the reason I am just fledgling foodie is that this is the only photo I managed to salvage from our amazing dinner at Cochon.