#15  LOUISIANA – Where Y’at, Y’all?

After a five day respite from breakfast restaurants while visiting our daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren in Texas, I decided it was most practical to hit Louisiana, Alabama, and Florida via the Gulf Coast. This would take us enticingly close to New Orleans where I am sure you can find 30 or 40 restaurants serving a fantastic breakfast. Since I had been to New Orleans on 12 different occasions, I stuck to my criterion of choosing a restaurant in a town I had never before visited. That town was Mandeville which lies on the North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain and is just a 35 mile trip to Bourbon Street, including traversing a 24 mile bridge over the lake.

In Mandeville, Liz’s Where Y’at Diner was the obvious choice for breakfast given the great reviews I found on Yelp and Tripadvisor. I was curious about the diner's name. Was Liz someone who was always missing? Perhaps the owner’s wayward dog?  After a deep dive into the internet, I discovered that Liz is Liz Mundy who owns the restaurant. Liz is a Yat which is a true native of New Orleans. According to her bio, her introduction to the food industry began working at the Foxy Balls Snowball Stand in the West End of New Orleans. Liz then waitressed for 15 years before she realized her dream of owning her own place.

Yat is derived from the greeting “where y’at”. You may meet a Yat in New Orleans who could very well say to you “where y’at”.  If you know what you are doing and want to act like a native you reply “what it is”. You can also respond with “alright”. I was prepared.

Liz’s Where Y’at Diner
Mandeville, Louisiana

AMBIENCE:  You can’t help but feel happy after walking into Liz’s Where Y’at Diner. The beach colors, quirky furniture, checkerboard floor, and cute sayings painted on the wall can't help but make you smile and clear the cobwebs from your mind, even before that first sip of coffee.

5 out of 5 stars.

FOOD:  We both ordered types of “scrambles”. A scramble is essentially an omelet without clothes. All the ingredients are hanging out there for you to see. I got the “Cool Brees” named after the New Orleans Saints quarterback. It just hit me now as I am writing this why the “Cool Brees” is one of the scrambles – because that’s what quarterbacks do when defensive linemen get close. Good one Liz! The “Cool Brees” contained bacon, ham, sausage, bell peppers, spuds, and pepper jack cheese or just about everything in the kitchen. It came with a biscuit and I ordered a side of grits because one review I read said they were the best in the United States.

My scramble was very good, the biscuit was tasty, but the grits were disappointing even with my supplementing them with a healthy splash of Louisiana hot sauce. As opposed to the grits I had in Tennessee, these had a soupy consistency. I am by no means a grits expert, but it seems to me that they should be eaten with a fork rather than a spoon. Although there are five more southern states to visit, I intend to go grits-less for the remainder of the trip.

The Healthy One ordered the vegetarian scramble with spuds, and a biscuit and declared it excellent.

4 1/2 out of 5 stars

COFFEE:  The coffee was better than what we had been getting elsewhere in the South but still not great.

3 1/2 stars out of 5

SERVICE: As I wrote above, I was totally prepared to answer the waitress when she asked “where y’at”.  It didn’t happen. Instead we got a “how Y’all doin?.” This made me believe that "where y'at" is strictly a New Orleans thing and that Mandevillians are in a different colloquialism sphere.  It turned out that “Y’all” was her go to word. “Y’all want some coffee?”  “Y’all ready to order?” “Y’all doing okay?” “Y’all finished?” “Y’all want the check?” Nevertheless, she was very friendly, didn’t screw up the order, and kept our coffee cups filled.

After breakfast, we left the car parked in front of the restaurant and took a 90 minute walk around the immediate neighborhood. Upon our return, the waitress came out to the car and asked us if “Y’all are okay?” because she noticed our car had been sitting in its space for a long time and she was worried. The Healthy One and I had different interpretations of this encounter, which points to the fact that our perspectives on a situation are not always Sympatico. The Healthy One thought our waitress was truly concerned that we had been kidnapped by Cajuns or been eaten by an alligator or something, while I thought she was just pissed that we had monopolized a parking space for a good chunk of time.

5 out of 5 stars

COST: $33.12 with tax and tip – our most expensive breakfast in the Southeast.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT MANDEVILLE:  

Mandeville is a small town of about 12,000 but is said to be rapidly growing. We walked about a mile from the restaurant to the Lake Pontchartrain shoreline through an evolving residential neighborhood. The first couple blocks held a few rundown houses but then we started to see more neat little “double shotgun” houses (i.e. two houses sharing a central wall).

The farther we walked the more the environment became “Old South” with huge moss-draped oak trees, mature gardens, and elegant 19^th century mansions. The Lake Pontchartrain waterfront was a gorgeous green space with a long walking/running path. On our walk back to the restaurant we were reminded how little mileage laid between us and New Orleans.

BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:

We followed two historical walking trails in Natchez, Mississippi and took the bluff trail along the Mississippi River. Curiously, we saw many more Hillary for President yard signs in Natchez than in any other town we visited on the entire trip.

November 1, 2016

NEXT UP: Alabama