Welcome to the Best of New Orleans! Food News 02 19 02

FOOD NEWS By Sara Roahen

02 19 02

'Beth Fest

As our attentions turn toward the next festival, Heidi Trull, chef-owner of Elizabeth's (601 Gallier St., 944-9272) in Bywater, has announced that she won't be serving her French fry po-boys and fried fruit pies at Jazz Fest this year. There will be no bellyaching from her followers, though, since she plans to open her breakfast/lunch-only restaurant for dinner during both festival weekends. "I hate not being here and seeing all my guests," she explains. So besides Elizabeth's regular routine of breakfast and lunch served Monday through Saturday, dinner hours will run from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday through Saturday on both weekends. Look for crabcakes with crawfish tartar sauce, South Carolina she-crab soup, blue cheese-stuffed ribeyes and fried chicken. And this news just in: Over Mardi Gras, Trull fetched a "custom-built barbecue pig cooker" from the Carolinas.

Grapevine

The annual New Orleans Wine & Food Experience (NOWFE), which was held on the weekend of July 13 in 2001, is moving up two months this year. The five-day wine and food blowout will take place Wednesday, May 22, through Sunday, May 26. The cost this year is $395 before March 15 and $425 after March 15. Admission gets you into all seminars, both Grand Tastings, the Royal Street Experience and the Sunday champagne jazz brunch. Call 529-WINE or log on at www.nowfe2.com.

Market Watch

Chef Corbin Evans of Lulu's (307 Exchange Alley, 525-2600), a new restaurant in the French Quarter, will be at the Crescent City Farmers Market today, Feb. 19. Catch his cooking demonstration at 11 a.m. The Saturday market will bring Cafe Atchafalaya's (901 Louisiana Ave., 891-5271) John Calon; demo begins at 10 a.m. The Tuesday market is at 200 Broadway St. and runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The Saturday market is at 700 Magazine St. and runs from 8 a.m. to noon. The Thursday market is at 3700 Orleans Ave. and runs from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Call 861-5898 or visit www.loyola.edu/ccfm.

Special Delivery

This month at Andrea's (3100 9th St., Metairie, 834-8583), Italian chef Andrea Apuzzo is celebrating "the robust food of the Piedmont" with a special menu that highlights some of the region's favored ingredients, including rice, venison and its own Barolo wine. Five-course dinners for $32 per person could include risotto alla Piemontese with Fontina cheese, quail stuffed with herbed Arborio rice, fried polenta and Barolo-poached pears.