The Joint: Always Smokin'

701 Mazant St, New Orleans, LA 70117

(504) 949-3232

                        Monday - Saturday 11:30 am – 10:00 pm, CLOSED SUNDAY

By:  Amy Thomas

Last night I had the pleasure of dining in the Bywater at The Joint--even passed up Pizza Delicious for it!

I'm from North Carolina originally and BBQ is something we take very seriously, and the great thing about The Joint is the selection of sauce--if you close your eyes you could be eating smoked meat from St. Louis, to Eastern North Carolina, to even South Texas/Mexico with the vinegary Habanero Sauce.  Smoked meat is something I urn for in my sleep...like a sexy man, it satisfies a guttural and primitive desire for me to see dark black coal-like mouth-watering, melt like butter
crust coating the outside, and pink rings and juices seductively revealing themselves inside.

The prices are pretty low, the service is excellent, the atmosphere is great.  I wish with the new bar they were a little more creative with the drinks, lets get some bacon vodka or whiskey, more smoked bourbons, scotches, and beers.

My only other complaint is in the sides.  The cole slaw is hard to mess up, but the macaroni and cheese has always been a little dry, room temp, and bland.  The salad is okay, my smoked tomato dressing wasn't as smoky as I would have wanted it to be, but it was still okay, and then your other choices are baked beans and potato salad, two more relatively uninspired options.

But the brisket, oh...the brisket.  The brisket makes the rest of the world melt away.

Christmas in New Orleans

Christmas in New Orleans is, in beauty, akin to Christmas in Paris--trade in the snarky locals for totally awesome laid back locals and they are equal in so many more ways than mere beauty.  This being my first Christmas in New Orleans I have tried to make my rounds and experience many of the town's holiday traditions.  Outside of seeing my first black Santa at the Thanksgiving parade down Decatur, my first stop was the Roosevelt Hotel.


 

 

I walked from the dark of night into an orgasmic wanderlust of sparkle and color and thousands upon thousands of lights.  It is magnificent.  It is also a little overwhelming, like a surreal cotton candy acid trip in the North Pole, but it is beautiful.  This has been a tradition of the hotel since 1994, but  the lobby had been decorated for Christmas off and on since the 40's, depending on the owners.  The birth of the version we see now, though it has evolved over the years, started in 2009 when the hotel reopened with a flourish after Katrina.

On Christmas Eve I had the opportunity to see the bonfires along the Mississippi. I'm always down for a good bonfire, add that to Christmas Eve and you've got a beautiful family evening.  Kind of feels like the kinds of things people would do where I grew up in North Carolina.  One of these families kindly brought me in to their bonfire circle and explained to me that the bonfires are supposed to guide Papa Noel, New Orleanian's Santa Claus.

I went to a play on a Réveillon dinner in the Bywater, which, for all intents and purposes, was a potluck. It has been explained to me by my lovely regular Miss. Gloria that when she was growing up the Réveillon dinner was the feast you ate on Christmas Eve that was supposed to ride you through Midnight Mass to Christmas morning. As most traditions the dinner has morphed into an opportunity for special prix fix menus at some of the best restaurants, gala opportunities in Uptown, and most importantly, an opportunity to get together with whatever form of family you have here and feast and drink and be merry.

My final Christmas in New Orleans moment included a walk to the Quarter to see the lights at Jackson Square, a chilly moment with the Mississippi River (this is for sanity, the river is so constant and calming), and a quiet moment along Decatur listening to a loan musician's rendition of Louis Armstrong's "Christmas in New Orleans".  My walk ended with Christmas Caroling at Washington Park near Frenchmen Street.  I had forgone the Jackson Square Caroling because I wasn't really in the mood for all of the people that would involve and knew the Washington Park one would be a good neighborhood activity.

New Orleans' Christmas has been criticized by some tourists for downplaying Christmas over New Years.  I have kind of seen this outside of the above, work hasn't been as busy, it seems like a lot of people went out of town, my neighborhood has been silent except for the random bursts of fireworks.  It would surprise me in no way shape or form if this was actually the case because New Orleans knows when to keep things sacred and when to party. 

Save the party for the eve of the New Year--which is in about 25 hours.

Dodgy Drunks & Pissed up Wankers. 2nd Installment

This morning I locked up my bike a couple of posts from a parked pick-up truck with the engine running.  I thought nothing of it at the time because the newspaper delivery guy drives the same truck and in my groggy 6am head I didn't even see the guy sitting in the front seat, and I didn't put much together very cognitively, I just assumed.... 

Almost an hour later I was bringing the out the patio furniture and was surprised to see this truck still out there, and still running.  After a brief consultation wit the famous Welmon Sharlhorne, whose artwork you can see at the Smithsonian, or here; who just so happened to be walking by, and which went a little like this:  "Can you kill yourself sitting in a running car if it's not in a garage?" and ended with Welmon, who looks like the spirit of the Saints barfed black and gold pimp glitter all over him, and is also one of my most favorite Frenchmen Street people, looking down at me from his lens-less gold rimmed glasses stating pointedly, "Oh, he's goin die".

After my co-worker and I knocked on the window for almost three minutes the man began to move as if coming out of a coma.  What looked like his attempt to roll down the window or turn the car off, I'm still not sure, he went on to run his hand into the radio like a blind zombie.  It was like watching life is slow motion rewind.  Three times he reached toward the radio but with no actual button triggered.  He then found the window lever and rolled it down a half inch and back up.  This guy was so wasted.  All the while he comes off as being completely oblivious to our yelling at him through the window, "Your car has been running for over an hour!" and  "Turn your engine off and sleep it out!".  He was moving around inside the running car with his arms and wobbling head, but denied us any response, much less a turn of the head to even look at us. 
 
Welmon said, "fu*% it, you woke him up.  You tried."  It was time to open the cafe so after a couple more attempts to get him to turn his engine off we went back inside, checking out the window every couple minutes to see if he was still there.  After a couple glances out the window, the truck was gone.  Vanished. 

The moment he was gone I didn't know what I regretted more, waking him up, or releasing this man to the world--in a vehicle. Shoulda called the cops, but it all felt like it happened so fast and even if we did, they would have never gotten there in time.

Fifteen minutes later in walks this sparkle faced, top hat wearing, vaudeville slaps the face of burlesque looking man. He was rather lively, his face was covered in red glitter, and he, being the only other person in the place at that time, went on to regal us with the stories of his night on mushrooms in New Orleans, starting with him in a nice suit and tie, and ending with him in a top hat, a burnt off tie (the knot and neck part still intact, and on him), a dirt covered blazer with matching tattered pants, and ridiculous sparkly red heeled man boots.  He apparently got slapped by a hooker, lost all his friends, found new ones, swapped shoes with a transvestite, rode a bike to the beginning of the Industrial Canal at the tip of Bywater across from the lower 9th Ward, was taken under the wing of Amzie Adams, the famous Frenchmen Street Artist and Spiritual Mentor, whose Art can be seen here, and caught a metal show at Hi-Ho Lounge.

His visit ended with us all dancing in the middle of the cafe to The Temptations.

Frady's One Stop Food Store, Bywater

Aaron and I were just looking for somewhere quick and easy for lunch and came upon a most excellent spot in Bywater today. I love it when I sound like some awfully radical Bill and Ted flashback.  Anyway, what we stumbled upon was an idealistically dusty and quaint family owned store called Frady’s One Stop Food Store offering meatloaf, spaghetti, greens, pies, tamales, and po’ boys, along with some grocery items.  We both went chef’s choice and got the roast beef po’ boy all the way.  What I opened up was this incredible sandwich, now I must also note this is my first New Orleans roast beef po’ boy, but this gravy, roast beef, Swiss cheese, french bread monster delicacy beats out most of the sandwiches I have had in my life by its mere simplicity and warm comfort it gave my belly.  Yummmmm.

Frady's One Stop Food Store

3231 Dauphine Street  New Orleans, LA 70117

(504) 949-9688