New book on La Louisiane's Diamond Jim Moran

Friends,

As you well know I am Impastato's biggest advocate. It is America's best Italian restaurant. Everything on the menu is fabulous. One dish in particular is especially fabulous and that is the fettuccini Alfredo, which topped TulaneLSU's Top 10 dishes of Impastato's. What many of you probably do not know is that dish has a long history stretching back nearly a century into the annals of New Orleans restaurant lore.

Most New Orleans restaurant lovers have heard the name Diamond Jim Moran. Some here may even have known him, although you would be really old if you did -- he died in 1958 of a massive coronary while working in his restaurant. His French Quarter restaurants were the standard of greatness in the 40s and 50s. While Galatorie's, Antoine's and Arnaud's were better known to the local elite, it was Moran's Diamond Jim's Food for Kings and his later acquisition of La Louisiane, not to mention his warm personality, that brought celebrity to the Quarter in a day when the Quarter was recovering from becoming a slum.

There was a little Sicilian immigrant still in his teens who found his way from his uncle's restaurant to La Louisiane in 1957. He worked his way up in the kitchen and helped refine and define that fettuccini dish. His name was Little Joe. Today he is known as Mr. Joe, as in Joe Impastato. He helped revolutionize fettucini Alfredo, turning New Orleans into the world capital of that dish.

I have great news this morning, as Diamond Jim's grandson recently self-published a book about his grandfather, Food For Kings: A New Orleans Legend. $20 for the black and white version, $40 for the one with photos in color. I purchased a few, some for Christmas gifts this year. In the book is the recipe for the fettuccini at Diamond Jim's son's restaurant, Jimmy Moran's Riverside, which was essentially the same served at La Louisiane, and I believe also Impastato's. I will report back after comparing the two. Either way, Moran was one of the most important restaurant figures in New Orleans during the 20th century. Any real New Orleanian should learn more about him if they want to understand how New Orleans became the nation's top Italian food city, and it is by many miles. As much as I love NYC, its Italian food, other than pizza, is a step behind us. Chicago is a joke for Italian food.

Yours,
TulaneLSU