Jones and I had a wedding in NOLA this past weekend to attend, so we decided to make a holiday food trip out of it. I wanted to hit some of the spots that I've heard lots of good things about, and Priceline let us name our own price for $60/night at Marriott and Renaissance, so this was the perfect weekend for it.

I didn't take photos in the restaurants because honestly, it's hard to remember.. and almost every restaurant in NOLA has people basically sitting on top of one another so it didn't feel appropriate.

I did, however, do some searching on Yelp and restaurant websites for photos of the items we did get. I couldn't find photos of them all, but I found some. I think photos make these threads more appealing/interesting, so I will post them with credit to Yelp now.

First up is Shogun in Metairie. This wasn't actually planned far in advance by us. Jones' uncle eats here every week, and asked us to go to lunch. Since we had no lunch plans, seemed like a perfect place to start our trip.

Personally, I don't find sushi to be "WOW!" I mean, I love sushi, but I don't even list it in comparison to other restaurants I love because I feel like it's kind of in it's own genre. But the sushi here was outstanding. We sat at the sushi bar and basically ordered recommendations from the chef. You tell him what fish you like, and he'll make his own sauces for them.

Some of what we ordered is included in these photos. We got Amberjack.. fresh scallops.. tuna.. salmon.. salmon belly..

The baked scallops were my favorite:

Wish I could give a more detailed review of the place, but it's hard to do when the chef is making it up has he goes. I'd certainly return though. Place is SLAMMED at lunchtime.

Next was dinner at Toup's Meatery.

I was so excited about this place for the meatery board. We ended up getting so many small plates, that we passed on entrees.

Their cocktails looked great, but I just stuck with the usual Henricks martini. The server kept coming back very quickly, so I felt pressured.

We got a couple of their specials to begin:

Ghost Pepper Caviar Deviled Eggs

Absolutely fantastic. I was afraid they would be too hot, as I'm a wimp, but they weren't at all. They were nice and vinegar-y too. We could have sat there and eaten these all night.

Also got a chargrilled oyster special with bacon.

These weren't terrible.. because I don't hate bacon. Unfortunately, bacon was all I could taste. We forgot to look at the price of them when the bill came, but they were very tiny too. I know sometimes that is out of the restaurant's control, but I also have been told they shrink in the chargrilling process. These were nickel-dime sized. With incredible flavor, that would not have been noticeable, but dime sized bites that taste like bacon.. meh.

Next was the Meatery Board. I had already seen photos, and boy did this impress.

The meats change depending on their specials for the day. The sausage of the day was a mozzarella sun-dried tomato sausage. It tasted like meatballs. Very good.

The board also comes with a cup of their cracklins, which I was addicted to.

My favorite item on the board, though, was the rillon, candied pork belly:

Along with the board, we got a side of the sweet and sour brussel sprouts. I haven't met a brussel sprout I don't like, so obviously I loved them. We certainly didn't need this extra side, though. We couldn't quite finish the whole board.

Total + tip = $96

The next day, we had lunch at Sylvain, per copious recommendations here on the board.

Boy, did I love this place. The atmosphere is so relaxed and casual. Granted, it was a Saturday, but it just felt like a place you were okay sitting and lingering for a while. No rush to turn tables. Service was perfectly timed, too. Toups was absolutely friendly, but they appeared at the table very often and it was clear they were trying to turn the tables quickly. Which is fine! But I enjoyed the relaxed experience at Sylvain more.

My only complaint about Sylvain is that they were out of the braised beef cheeks, which was the #1 thing I wanted.

We started with the veal sweetbreads, which were "buffalo style". I was beyond pleased with these. This wasn't your typical buffalo sauce. It seemed to be cut with a cream or something to make the flavor much milder. And it came with a pickled slaw.

For entrees, Jones got the bolognese pasta. It was delicious, and nothing interrupted the meat flavor, as it should be.

Unfortunately, I could not find a photo of mine, but I got the Texas Roasted Quail which was stuffed with cornbread dressing and served over creamed mustard greens with a bacon vinaigrette. The waiter recommended this dish to me when they were out of beef cheeks, and he did a pretty good job in that regard. This was so delicious. As a diner next to me pointed out (because they tables are so damn close!), it was nice how they deboned the quail yet it kept it's shape. I usually hate ordering birds in restaurants because you look like a barbarian using your hands, but it's impossible to cut from the bones. This was so easy to eat.

I finished the entire plate.

For dessert, we got the sweet cream gelato. Tasted just like butter. Was a perfect ending to the meal.

Total + tip = $93

That night was the wedding, so no dinner. Ceremony was in the St. Louis Cathedral and reception was on the top floor of the Westin at Canal Place, so great times were had.. yummy drinks were drank.. and the food was pretty good too. Obviously, had to step out of the reception to the hotel bar to catch the nerve-wracking Saints 4th quarter.

This post was edited on 1/7/14 at 4:00 pm