Time
for a road trip! Laurie and I decided to
meet Dawn Marie down in New Orleans for some fun and food just before
Christmas. It was our present to each
other and a new experience for Laurie. She
hadn’t been to New Orleans since she was conceived…if you get my meaning!
I’d
visited New Orleans several times for fun back in the early to mid-70’s and had
been back a couple of other times for business conferences. My last visit had been just 2 years before
Hurricane Katrina and I was curious about the status of the city’s recovery…
We
decided to drive to Laurel Mississippi on our 1st day. That would mean that we’d have a minimal
drive into New Orleans on our 2nd day, giving us some time to visit
the city’s new WWII Museum.
As
usual, I spent some time researching the restaurants in each town or city on
our itinerary. Laurel Mississippi offered
2 interesting dining choices but after we arrived in town I learned that one of
our choices wasn’t open for dinner. Hence, this is The Loft on Central Avenue
which is located in the old historic downtown section of Laurel.
The
Loft on Central Avenue was a ‘happening place’ on this Thursday night! It’s a big restaurant so we didn’t have any
trouble getting a table but the place was filled with Christmas office party
groups…
I
believe that this building was previously an old bank and the décor was
definitely ‘loft-like’ with what might be faux plaster patches over the brick walls. If my research is correct, the Loft used to
actually occupy the loft of this building…
This is
our "appetizer!" Yikes! For some reason it’s called the Norwood
Appetizer… It consists of Cajun Flavored BBQ Shrimp surrounded by toasted
French bread for dipping in the sauce.
This huge pile of shrimp floating in the sauce with all of the French
bread cost only $12.00!
In this
case, superlatives completely escape us!
Laurie and both agreed that we would be willing to roll in this sauce…
This was the best appetizer that we’ve had in many years! Terrific! Super! Spectacular! Amazing!
Despite the fact that we had entrees coming, we demolished this platter
of goodness… There wasn’t a drop of sauce, a smidgen of shrimp or a bite of bread
left when we finished.
For her
entrée, Laurie ordered the Creole Shrimp Pasta. ($17.00) It came with a modest but
OK dinner salad and a roll…which was used to mop up some more of the appetizer's sauce. Laurie said that her entrée was
very good…but it was tough following up on our appetizer. She couldn’t finish her pasta, so I helped her...It was excellent! The sauce and shrimp were full of delicious spicy Creole flavour!
For my
dinner, I selected the Steak Alfredo. ($16.00) This consisted of strips of
ribeye steak cooked medium rare on a bed of Penne (my choice) Pasta Alfredo. The steak was pretty good but I thought that
the Alfredo sauce was perhaps a bit too thin and a little bland for my taste. But don’t get me wrong…I did enjoy my entrée.
This
photo of our shared dessert is blurred…and in my opinion…deservedly so. Our waitress ‘got lost’ a lot after another
customer confronted her on a problem and it took her forever to come up with
our bread pudding. ($6.00) When we got it, it was just a blob of bread pudding
on a plate...without the caramel topping.
Finding and applying the topping was a major time consuming project! After all of that effort, I thought that the
bread pudding was way too mushy…although Laurie said that it was OK in her
opinion but not warm enough for her tastes.
Despite
a couple of issues, The Loft on Central Avenue in Laurel Mississippi was a
winner! (I concur with TripAdvisor’s ratings which showed 28 Excellent or Very
Good reviews vs. 2 Poor or Terrible reviews prior to our trip) We will return…and
probably share an entrée along with that Norwood Appetizer! This restaurant is located at 535 Central
Avenue. Phone: 601-518-0404. The Loft on Central Avenue can be found on
Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/theloftoncentral.
Just
click on any of the photos to enlarge them…
Thanks
for stopping by and sharing our dinner with us!
Take
Care, Big Daddy Dave
When it's good enough to roll in it has to be delicious. I can just hear Laurie uttering several quick OMG's
ReplyDeleteThe food all looks great! And even the little "hole in the wall place" has great food. We've been there many times with Bill handling conventions there for RR assoc, before he retired. Enjoyed the museum also. Seeing this makes me want to return one of these days when it's warm. Sounds like your restaurant was really busy with all the parties!
ReplyDelete