I had a medical procedure today and as a result had to fast since Wednesday. Therefore, I was seriously hungry. As a result, I didn’t care about gourmet food for lunch. I cared about a LOT of food. Bad food. Fried food. Quantity over quality. This place fits the bill.
This place has a huge buffet. First off, the sign outside lied. There were no red beans or jambalaya on the buffet. The service was great with a waitress constantly checking on us. I asked if they were going to put red beans on the buffet. She said no, but offered to check and see if they had some in the back and she said she’d warm some up for me. I declined but that was very nice of her. You could actually eat kind of healthy here if you wanted to. The buffet starts with a nice little salad bar and there was baked fish on the buffet. But I wasn’t interested in healthy eating.
The fried chicken was delicious! Crispy and well seasoned. The fish however wasn’t. Crispy but not very well seasoned. There was also a lack of sides for the chicken and fish. White rice, boiled lime beans and buttered, cut up red potatoes was about it. I didn’t try the lima beans but the potatoes were good. There was cornbread and garlic bread if you want to consider that sides. Speaking of the garlic bread, it was slices of French bread with a delicious garlic butter on it, but it was cold. So were the crab cakes. At a buffet you wouldn’t expect crab cakes to be loaded with lump crab meat, but they had a decent amount of crab meat and a good flavor. But again, they were cold. Cold as in came out the fridge and hadn’t yet even made it to room temperature.
To go on the white rice they had chicken and sausage gumbo, chicken etoufee and shrimp creole. The gumbo and shrimp creole were pretty good. There was a big pan labeled “Oysters Bienville”. It should have been labeled “Mock Oysters Bienville”. It tasted exactly like the green bean casserole you get around Thanksgiving made with the cream of mushroom soup and the fried onions out the can, but there were no oysters in it. Instead mushroom, which kind of substituted for oysters, and maybe some pieces of artichoke. It was actually pretty good! The lasagna had no meat in it. Just cheese and sauce, but it was good. There were boiled shrimp on the salad bar and they were very good! Very well seasoned with a nice, horseradishy cocktail sauce. The picture doesn’t do it justice.
For dessert there was a big pan of bread pudding and something called “Chocolate Ice Box Pie”. The chocolate pie stuff was very good! As was the bread pudding. No raisins, pineapple or weird stuff in it. Just good bread pudding. But the vat of rum sauce, which I love, was horrible. It tasted like they cooked some rum and butter for a while then dumped in a bag of sugar, stirred and served. The sugar wasn’t melted at all. Still gritty. That seems to be the norm unfortunately because I’ve been here in the past and that’s the way it was.
Anyway, it’s an all you can eat buffet, so don’t expect gourmet food if you come here. If you want “all you can eat buffet” type of food, I recommend this place.
8853 Veterans Memorial Blvd., Metairie, LA 70003 Ph: 504-468-3663
Blaine 9-8-2017
SUPPLEMENTAL REPORT:
Back today! My birthday was yesterday. Denny’s sent me an email saying for my birthday month I could come in and get a free birthday slam or dessert. I absolutely LOVE free food! So I headed over there to eat.
Well, the only Denny’s in the New Orleans area happened to be closed for some reason. So I started wandering around aimlessly wondering where I’d eat and saw this place. I was starving by that time and all you can eat sounded good.
( THE FOOD )
Fried chicken, chicken and sausage gumbo, white beans loaded with sausage and ham, fried fish, carrot soufflé, eggplant casserole, roasted pork in brown gravy, mac n cheese, spinach and artichoke dip, bread pudding and that chocolate pudding pie thing. Everything was great, except, AGAIN, the sauce for the bread pudding. It had the same uncooked gritty sugar texture. I guess that’s just their recipe.
Overall, a great lunch!
8853 Veterans Memorial Blvd., Metairie, LA 70003 Ph: 504-468-3663
Blaine 9-26-2021
BLAINE'S RESTAURANT REPORT 