Looking for opinion on Brigsten's and Clancy's in NOLA

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Both are excellent

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Both are great but would pick Brigsten's.

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The Shell Beach Diet dish at Brigtsen's is pretty unique. It's a huge seafood platter and none of it is fried.

Clancys is one of my favorite meals in New Orleans

The oysters and brie are very good, probably a touch overrated. Sweetbreads top notch.

I've had a special oyster and pasta bordelaise dish once that I thought was very good.

It is a menu where there are a whole lot of really solid dishes that depending on how well they are executed that night can range from good to great. To me it is more a restaurant in which the sum of the parts make it a great restaurant and not just the food. But that also means if one thing falls out (say service or food is off) it loses some of its luster.

Clancy's

Sazerac
Crab salad
Oysters and Brie
Smoked soft shell crab
Lemon ice box pie

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best dishes at Clancys?

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The smoked soft shell crab is one of if not the best soft shell preparation in the city. My father is a big Clancy's guy, so we go quite a bit and I order it every time in season.

I also prefer Clancy's over Brigtsen's (biased as I grew up eating there). Maybe I am in the minority, but after 4 meals there, I have never been overly impressed with Birgtsen's. (I do wish Clancy's would print a normal menu though. Stupid script is a pain in the arse to read with dim lighting)

I've been to both multiple times. I like Clancy's, but I don't love it like many folks. Don't get me wrong, the place puts out darn fine food.

I love Brigtsen's. I had dinner there over the weekend and it was outstanding. I also like the atmosphere there and Frank comes out to visit the tables. It's a very friendly place. Service was terrific as always. I "think" Brigtsen's changes the menu offerings more often seasonally and uses a lot of local produce etc... Clancy's may use local foods, but I'm not sure I've noticed much in the way of seasonal offerings or not as much.

Frank just posted a great photo of what is apparently a new app with creole tomatoes, crab claws and fresh crabmeat. It looks delicious. I would have ordered it had it been available.

I had the bbq shrimp app with shrimp calas for the app. Delicious. Other diner had the sea scallops with stone ground fontina cheese grits and fire roasted vegetable salsa. It was not only delicious but so well presented.

Other diner had the pan fried snapper amandine with crabmeat and brown butter. I had the shell beach diet mentioned. I couldn't begin to eat it all and should have refrained from the app. The platter had one of the scallops like the app, grilled redfish with shrimp and jalapeno lime sauce, crawfish cornbread with jalapeno smoked corn butter (sort of like a spoon bread), baked oyster with bacon, leeks, cream spinach and romano, baked oyster Le Ruth with shrimp and crabmeat and shrimp boil slaw with corn and potatoes. Everything on the plate was outstanding in flavor. I love having so many things to taste. It's sort of like getting a lot of apps, but it's plenty of food. The blueberry bread pudding with white chocolate and blueberry sauce it not to be missed. I had the pecan pie which is always good, but I wished I'd gotten that bread pudding. It was so delicious.

There was a wonderful soft shell crab special that I saw go by, but I couldn't quite steer myself away from the platter.