Your Guide to the Coolest Neighborhoods in North America, Page 3

  Chapter 3 - NEW ORLEANS: Belle Grieve

  Skeletons and Closets

  Romantic, fecund, mossy.

  All of these words described the food in the Amtrak café car traveling to New Orleans from Texas. I finally arrived at my destination--the River City, Jazz Capital of the World, the Great Gulf Gigolo, Trash Compactor of Hurricanes and Southern Street-Walker Extraordinaire--in the early morning after a fitful night, especially enjoying the unscheduled layover next to an oil refinery– the smell nearly put me in a coma, and I broke into hives.

  After the Amtrak train-crew gallantly gave me a haz-mat suit, I crawled into that white silky cocoon, leaving it just a touch unzipped for air, and slept like a koala baby. Still waylaid, I awoke and slipped out of the train, and siphoned into a large plastic reservoir some unrefined oil from a small unguarded pool at the edge of the property, jumped back on the train, and upon our arrival, re-sold the two liters-worth to a woman pushing a shopping cart at New Orleans Union Station; she said that she had been a residential real estate investor in Florida during the property bubble. Leaving in my hands a small wad of bills, she disappeared into the recesses of the station.

  Outside the station, the air was thick with possibility, humidity and tragedy…a typical New Orleans broth that I was more than ready to drink with my French roast, and then drink some more. Not for me the tourist beignets. I wanted the unusual 'reverse beignets’ of a creative cook in my target neighborhood. And, I couldn’t wait to sample that secret elixir, reportedly the earliest cocktail made below the Mason-Dixon line, known as the Catafalque– so powerful and intoxicating a beverage that it’s said to have caused a naïve 19th century mayoral aide to spontaneously combust.

  As visitors’ centers so often point out, this part of the world has seen many different flags fly over its historic confines. I would plant my own flag of fun as I tracked down the whereabouts, and secrets of the up and comer, Belle Grieve (or Duroblier’s Closet), known heretofore only to paroled state legislators, and the occasional brave tourist.

  But who was Duroblier? And what was in his famous closet? These were questions I had researched for many months with little luck, or regard for feelings. I called every Duroblier in southern Louisiana, and received many pieces of advice, some of it in Cajun dialect, and some of it of a threatening nature. Finally, upon the advice of a hustler on Canal St., I boarded the streetcar at Esplanade, designated Retirer—for the suburb to which it travels, and at which it terminates its lumbering journey—and alighted at none other than Belle Grieve Cemetery (Station: Robusto St. at Ramblanade.)

  I’ve provided the tram information here: Number 73 Streetcar, to Retirer, terminating at Ave. Chien de Sommeil). Stops at: Levee Theodore Roosevelt, Muffaletta St. (at Ramblanade, Belle Grieve), Tangiers Ave. (at Ramblanade, Belle Grieve), Robusto St. (at Ramblanade, Belle Grieve), Parc Sublime, Canal No. 3, Poisson Mort, Talleyrand Circle, Harpsichore St., Le Coin, Beauharnais Ave., Guiana St., Barbudian Exchange.

  Belle Grieve takes its name from both the cemetery and the famous house, a frightful Southern Gothic pile, (what else would it be?) abutting the cemetery grounds. As I finally learned, the house is famous for Duroblier's Closet—the largest closet in the world, which ultimately took up much of the Belle Grieve House that Erasme Duroblier, the last direct descendant of the famous Creole cemetery-keeping family, occupied, and later, shared with his life-partner—although they were known in the parlance of the time as meilleurs amis (best friends). Escaping the bulk of Hurricane Katrina’s floodwaters, the neighborhood's fortunes seem to have risen as the waters receded. It is mostly located along the broad avenue known as The Ramblanade. And, until recently, it had been home to a tame alligator owned by two male hoteliers and partners; the reptile, "Edwin" was, however, now missing, prompting a city-wide search.

  Old-timers living in this quarter have a hard time understanding how this sleepy, down-at-the-heels area could rate as hip. For these residents, it’s a dreary neighborhood centered around a famous burial ground, and the strange old house next door. Au contraire! For just now, the breezes from over-priced ceiling fans were beginning to blow across aromatic candles and interesting ‘small-plates’ meals in Belle Grieve. Where should a Southeast Asian food-truck park, if not near a cemetary? I could not ignore these markers, just to preserve some geriatric sense of normalcy.

  To continue...after alighting from the uncomfortably empty Retirer streetcar, I checked into a little boutique hotel that is getting rave reviews from those who are not bothered by paranormal activity, or oil paintings that follow your every movement. The Melancholia Arms (56 Humide Place, at Cyclone St.) is run by the very gayest couple I have ever encountered on a trip—and that is saying something, as I am gay, and, in any case, well-traveled.

  I had no idea the Elizabethan ruff, or the mantilla, had made comebacks, especially among men, and especially with blue-jeans. Still, the Confirmation Day Tasting Menu at breakfast—Cajun Deviled Eggs, cucumber salad, smoked oysters, a Sazerac cocktail, alligator skewers, and nutria croquets--made up for any confusion the hoteliers’ sartorial choices might have caused. Although it wasn’t quite what I had in mind early in the morning, it was included in the bill and I ate it with gratitude.

  And, it was while enjoying my early repast in the moist confines of the Melancholia’s brick and moss courtyard, a helpful visitor arrived. Eglantine “Eggie” Simmonsweal, the Duroblier descendant, and force behind the restoration of the cemetery, the main house and, indeed, the neighborhood, presented herself as my guide to Belle Grieve. Once just a typical post-graduate Gulf Coast sea-turtle rescuer--who had somehow managed to matriculate from Mobile’s Spring Hill College without a fiancée—Eggie had returned after two turtle egg-laying seasons to the place she knew best, her second home along The Ramblanade, the great cemetery keeper’s house next to Belle Grieve Cemetery.

  “My great-aunt, Eugenie Shreve Thibodeaux, was Erasme Duroblier’s cousin, twice-removed by marriage and natural disasters,” announced Eggie, after leaning in, uninvited, to finish off the rest of my Confirmation Breakfast. “She was the last person to live in Belle Grieve House, before it was willed to the foundation that takes care of it. I’m the head of the foundation, so I live there and keep it tidy and give tours in the ‘grief-mobile,’ which is basically just a 1953 hearse that the morticians next-door had garaged since, oh, about 1971,” Eggie prattled, while licking her fingers clean, after depositing several tiny croquets in her own yammering maw.

  "Of course, as you already probably know, or as the Bruces (Leighton Bruce and Bruce Gomez, the Melancholia owners) may have told you, most of the second floor is taken by the largest closet east of the Mississippi. Duroblier kept the contractors busy building it, and adding to it, until it wiped out virtually all of the bedrooms except for the master suite. He was a bit of a clotheshorse…as was Clive, his buddy.”

  Eggie arose, motioned with her head for me to follow, saying what I thought was Cajun for, “Let’s do this sucker.” It was actually Pig Latin—Eggie is fluent, turns out.

  “Basically, a typical weekend at Belle-Grieve in the 1880s and 1890s began something like this,” —and here, Eggie took out the diary of her relative by marriage, Duroblier himself. A funeral, attended by the family, would commence after a large breakfast. The family would gather on the verandah, overlooking the cemetery, while the Erasme’s father or uncles went out to manage the interment. It was the family’s custom to send the beloveds off with good-wishes:

  “Greet the mourners, greet them!," shouted mother. "Bon Voyage," grande-mere would shout. "Adieu," waved Oncle Peyroux. And then, I, little, fragile, sensitive, terrified, Erasme, would go and hide in the closet of my vast bedroom. When grande-mere and grand-pere had themselves been interred, and mama and papa were gone, and mon oncles had also gone into the beyond, the job of keeper of Belle-Grieve Cemetery passed out of the Duroblier family forever, as I would not take it under any circumstance. Instead, I occupied myself in the study wi
th my map collection, plotting shipping routes, and train lines, and roads, in the tranquil afternoons.

  —from The Journal of Erasme Duroblier, 1887-1964; Louisiana State Archives

  However, tranquility didn’t last, Eggie noted. New Orleans’ Mayor during these years around the turn of the last century was Prosper Panatella, a family friend. Panatella was aware of Erasme's map collection, which he pronounced in his thick Louisiana accent, at a dinner in March, 1902:

  “…fah n’awah, da fahn’st cash ‘a gee’graf’cal aydes to nav’gahtory ‘n explor’tory doc’amenshun a da knoiwan soiface ‘a de plant since de Lous’ane poichus waws ih-self poichus.” (translation: "…far and away, the finest cache of geographical aids to navigatory and exploratory documentation of the known surface of the planet since the Louisiana Purchase was itself purchased.")

  Shortly thereafter, the then-Chief Cartographer of Orleans Parish was given a special commission by the mayor: explore the coast of Guyana for spices and gold—he was never heard from again. And, after six months, Duroblier, who had been occupying the cartographer job in an interim capacity, was declared the city's Chief Cartographer.

  While working as a cartographer, in the Plats and Waterways Department, he met an important staff member, Thierry Hanrahan, known as "Clive". Hanrahan was the Deputy Assistant Cartographer for Investigations. Investigations at this time were said to vary in subject and scope. Houses, lots, even streets could disappear in New Orleans, the result of water seepage, or sinkholes, or voodoo. If a curse were put on a house, it might become invisible for a day, or a week, or even for a year. Street sign names changed with alacrity, or, accents ague disappeared or re-appeared on the signs—a matter of considered quite grave. Addresses were changed in order to evade city tax collectors, or avoid tariffs if the address held valuable overseas cargo.

  The job of the cartographic inspector addressed all of these problems. Sometime in the late 1890s, Clive became Duroblier's housemate, and they were seen forever after at city functions together, and sometimes with the unmarried Creole sisters Droupier, Adeline and Hermania. Sometimes they were seen by themselves. Duroblier and Clive vacationed together as well: Hot Springs, Arkansas was a favorite, as was the town of Saugatuck on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. By the end of World War I, the pair had bought a house in Tucson, and spent part of the winter there. The one place they were not seen together was at church: Duroblier attended St. Anthony the Abbot, a Roman Catholic Church on Muffaletta St., in Belle Grieve, while Clive attended the Episcopal Christ Church Cathedral on St. Charles Ave.

  Thus did Duroblier and his partner pass into history.

  Today, very few celebrity chefs from New Orleans come ‘round Belle Grieve, as its cuisine had been subsumed long ago into the traditions of greater New Orleans. Still, some have relocated to Belle-Grieve in the hopes of forming a new base of support; many people in Belle-Grieve, taking their cue from Hurricane Katrina, keep their backyards flooded as paddies, in order create a sustainable supply of locally-grown rice. Because of this, bare feet are allowed in most restaurants and stores, where Belle Grieve residents, fresh from their backyard paddies, clean their feet off in special foot-washes. Note: do not use these for cleaning shoe soles; these are only for cleaning foot-pads.

  Centime is a lovely café run by the Tagette family, in the French tradition, on a Belle-Grieve side street, where the famous reverse-beignet, called reignet (WREN-yay) reigns supreme. Fluffy on the outside, and full of powdered sugar on the inside, no one is quite sure how they make them—and don’t ask because they’ll give you a sort of Cajun evil-eye. Next thing, you’re a swamp creature. Reignet and coffee is $4.95 (456 Sarcophagus St.). Still, Proprietress Cerise Tagette sells mysterious reignet mix, when she’s not taping her YouTube cooking show. Edwin the alligator was reportedly very fond of reignets, and the alligator trappers had set up a trap in the alley behind Centime with some reignets for Edwin; thus far, there had been no takers.

  At Restaurant Reliquary (761 Tangier St.), they dispense with the niceties: both the waitstaff and food are dressed in black. Bring a flashlight—the interior is kept tomb-dark. Owner Colza Wiles, the daughter of a New Orleans coroner, went to art school, where she majored in kinetic sculpture and minored in food styling. She took her goth-inspired recipes, and created Reliquary. Sweet breads are popular here. They use a lot of squid ink, and food coloring. And, they have appropriated the famously explosive cocktail, the oldest mixed drink in the western hemisphere: the Catafalque. Comparable to a mixologist’s version of the Japanese dish of Fugu, or blowfish, combining the Catafalque ingredients in the wrong way can yield a delayed reaction that causes an actual explosion, hence the Lousiana mixology license with a certification in Catafalque construction.

  The Catafalque

  ½ Rye Whiskey

  1 part brandy

  1 part dark Rum

  1 sugar cube

  1 maraschino cherry

  Dark Chocolate Shavings

  1 splash apple cider vinegar

  1 pinch cayenne

  1 egg yolk

  1 egg white

  1 sprinkle cinnamon

  ½ part Kahlua or coffee liquor

  1 dash secret ingredient (some use licorice, wood-shavings, saltpeter or turmeric)

  Directions: Combine all alcohols; beat in yolk. Eat cherry, and throw stem behind you, bowing to the four cardinal directions. Throw in the sugar cube and cayenne, pour mixture into a cocktail shaker with shaved ice. Whip the egg white until frothy. Say: “take that, (name of spurned lover), you scoundrel (or ‘daughter of a muskrat’).” While whistling "Dixie" in a minor key, pour mixture into martini glass, pour in vinegar splash, pour in egg whites on top, sprinkle chocolate shavings. Pluck a hair out of your head, or eyebrow. Light a candle. Make a wish—singe the hair in the flame. Add secret ingredient, and stir. Recite “Ring Around the Rosey.” Drink Catafalque in several continuous gulps. Shout, “laissez le bon temps rouler.” Throw glass against the wall, into street or into the fireplace.

  A trip to New Orleans would not rate as authentic without touching some aspect of Mardi Gras, and the clubs that form the basis of the parades around town. Eggie offered to take me to the secret warehouse of the Mardi Gras krewe representing Belle Grieve; long-dormant, it had been revived by some urban pioneers hoping to inject a sense of life into a neighborhood known mostly for rituals surrounding death. However, those rituals proved a little too strong to overcome--even amidst a celebration.

  The Belle Grieve Social Club for Revelry had taken over the old offices of the Empire Southern Tropicale Sugar Company; their floats for the Krewe de Tyche, named after the god of fortune and chance, were focused on the role of these elements in daily life. For if an alligator, disease or hurricane can sweep life away, then the roll of the dice must be celebrated. But the theme of this year’s float was in some question.

  Should the float focus, as Eggie had hoped, on the life and times of Erasme Duroblier? Eggie’s idea involved a giant closet with two members of the social club playing Erasme and his friend, Clive Hanrahan. A closet, laid bare with a 1000 garments from the early years of the last century would hang on the float. Float designer Martin Ecrevisse, this year’s Colonel du Krewe, let me in to this warehouse and we gazed up at the giant paper-mache head of a joker from a playing card rolling the dice at a craps table. The giant joker’s head bobbed a little, as if to mock my attempts at understanding the reality of Belle-Grieve, but also, basically, as a gentle reminder that gamblings themes have been prominent on previous float.

  The Krewe de Tyche meeting was called to order and the krewe’s secretary, Beneva Lecoire, read out the final description of the float for the up-coming Mardi Gras.

  “At the center, top, stands the Belle Grieve House, surrounding by cardboard and paper-mache mausoleums and tombstones; members of the krewe stand behind their designated burial plots and play Le Diable a Mangé Mon Dejeuner ("The Devil Ate My Lunch"), a popular 1910s music hall ditty. T
he musicians serenade Edwin the Alligator, as he lumbers around the float. At the float’s rear, Colza Wiles will cook a meal of Cajun-style tripe in a working kitchen, while hunters move around her, trying to trap nutria in a faux-bayou made of gelatin and straw.

  Eggie stood up: “I will not cook a nutria, and I think we ought focus on sustainable produce. Where are our famous rice paddies?

  Martin responded, “This celebrates Belle-Grieve’s heritage. And, the paddies offer a level of technical complication that we do not have the financial resources to replicate.”

  Cerise stood up, but broke down in tears, telling the small group that her little terrier, Jean Lafitte, was missing. With that the meeting broke up.

  Bistro Badinage (Ave. Noixville at Cacophonie Place), is a hot ticket in Belle-Grieve, with food that is light, playful and downright silly. The chef, Percy Flage, who was a professional clown for years, dresses up a grouper cooked in its own skin in a gingham frock, while savory muffins have eyes made of coffee beans, noses of jalapeno, and mouths of pimento. It’s confusing, tasty and a whole lot of fun, if you have the patience for these things, which lots of folks in Belle-Grieve do.

  Fiat Lux (938 Sarcophagus St.) sheds light on situations, both supernatural and real. The writer and wiccan, Beltane Earp, who runs Tulane University's screen-writing program, took her late grandmother’s candle factory and store, Candelabrum and Co., and turned it into a veritable temple to the chandler’s arts. There are religious candles, time-keeping candles, beeswax candles, tallow candles and a variety of aromatic candles for which her grandmother’s recipe book—kept secret--has come in most handy. Cinaster is a beguiling combination of cinnamon and aster flowers. Poprika combines the spiciness of Paprika and the seductive scent of a genus of poppy. The Cambion model changes colors as it burns, and is especially useful for casting spells on irksome employers and pesky neighbors, I was told.

  Back at the cemetary, I grabbed a spring-roll from Banh! Banh! (Tuesday-Sunday, front gate, Belle-Grieve Cemetary, 11-2), the Vietnamese food-truck one usually finds outside broken-down old burying grounds in the Deep South. Truthfully, the BP oil spill had pushed the longtime Southeast Asian fishing community here to the breaking point, and a younger member had pushed into uncharted, but vital new eating territory, with a re-made Mr. Smoothie truck, peddling Pho, rolls and the steamed Indochinese cakes, Banh Mi. The owner blackened my cakes, sprinkled them with Tabasco, shouted "bon appetit," and tossed a Cajun-Indochinese meal onto the counter, worthy of its multi-cultural heritage.

  Then, I ran into Eggie, who revealed details of what I longed hoped for, and without which, my tour of Belle Grieve would have been less than complete: the famous zombie jazz bar known as Le Grimoire (#43E Ratoon Alley), or in local parlance, ‘The Grim.’ Here, for a price that is quite high and never quoted verbally, customers are locked in for a possible appearance by the only jazz combo of living dead on the planet. Whether you come out or not after the performance is said to depend upon how appreciative you are of musicians, and whether they like you. Although it sounded to me like a typical stadium rock-concert, Eggie insisted it happens only on full moons and in leap years. Sadly, with neither available on my trip, I gave up the idea of a visit.

  Day Trip: if you want take an authentic paddle-wheeler upriver from the Tangier St. Pier in Belle Grieve, tours stop at some of the old places where riverboats used to call. Once, these plantations were scenes of great cruelty toward their slave laborers. You would think that would give some travelers pause, but it doesn't—not when there's gambling, good food and congenial travel-mates on the trip. Truth be told, these trips are educational. A creaking old riverboat, known as the Marie Royale plies the tourist-laden waters. I decided to visit Shibboleth Forest, a grand old house and plantation—now restored—which has ties to Belle-Grieve; Shibboleth’s original owners kept a pied-a-terre in Belle-Grieve, long since demolished.

  At the Shibboleth pier, we were greeted by the docents, one black and one white—two women presenting at once the spectrum of Louisiana history.

  “Welcome to Shibboleth Forest. I am Cherisse Haycroft, a descendant of Shibboleth's enslaved population, and this is Rose-Marie Wilcoxen, a descendent of the Meunieres, who owned this property. Shibboleth Forest was one of the nastiest, meanest plantations in the South. But it’s been lovingly restored by its current owners, retired Gulf Coast Oil Company Chairman Lawrence Endwell and his wife Laurel, and it’s an official Louisiana State Historic Site. As descendants, we take great pride in showing you around. We don’t hide anything. This is a warts and all tour. Whipping sites, slave quarters, outhouses, formerly malarial swamps, mausoleums...we’ve got and you’ll see it.”

  Rose-Marie introduced the property with a slice of history: “Now, my great-great-great grandfather, Crudite Meuniere, raped Cherisse's great-great-great-great grandmother, Galette Meuniere, who was enslaved on this plantation, and she had a child, and so Cherisse and I are also related,” Rose-Marie said, matter-of-factly, while shoving a tray of some freshly-made sweets at us. “Pralines? They’re made right here, and they’re dee-licious. Isn’t that right Cherisse?”

  “You bet your cotton bale, they are,” replied Cherisse, with surprising equanimity.

  And with that disturbing factoid, we were off on a fascinating trip into the economy and life of the Old South. I had a good time—or as good a time as one could have while visiting this kind of place. All of that labor the slaves performed on the plantation had bought rich carpets, enormous drapes, furniture from Europe and a well-stocked kitchen for the Meunieres. But, as they say in these parts, it also bought a little bit of crazy. The Meunieres were free with their saber and gun usage, and were constantly offing their kin. Pretty soon, the place was ownerless, and fell into antebellum disrepair.

  On the way back the boat stopped at Ceuta, a crossroads town that was once a dilapidated, dying river hamlet, full of impoverished white trash, and little to buy. Now, it's full of rich white trash, and a whole range of shopping options, too. After a young mayor convinced business people to upgrade their stores to serve tourists, residents have either gone in for servicing the tourist trade, or taken a powder for the Florida Panhandle beaches.

  “It’s mostly the same people as before,” noted Mayor Claude Meuniere, “but now they’re nice to everyone, because they wants your money.”

  Cheered by Ceuta’s newly progressive outlook, I stepped into a hoary old currency-trading and numismatic shop—which, like, all the other stores in town, sells ice-cream and fudge on the side—to check out the goods. S. Moneda and Sons (“Dealers in distressed, old, new, worthless and valuable currencies”) had some interesting pieces for sale: a 19th-century 100-taler note from the long-vanquished Duchy of Vandenberg, now part of Thuringia, in Germany, retailed for $75. A 50-ecre silver piece from the Territory of Nueva Murcia, a former sliver of Peru in the 18th century, was priced at $456; the price seemed steep, but was told it came with a map to the silver-mine where it had originated. Candles and black clothing also were for sale.

  Grabbing a quickly-melting sundae, I repaired to the Marie Royale for the trip back to Belle Grieve.

  Upon my return from Shibboleth Forest, I was greeted at the dock by a grim-faced Eggie. She reported that Edwin’s body had been found, and, sadly, the cause of the death was likely indigestion from supping on a local pet.

  We proceeded to the death scene, at the Levee Theodore Roosevelt, where on the banks of Canal #3, Edwin had come to his finally resting place, caused, the coroner said, by indigestion from eating Cerise Tagette’s male mixed terrier, Jean Lafitte—a possible drowing victim. Nearby, floating serenely in the water, was a female alligator that apparently was watching to see whether Edwin’s meal-catching prowess was up to snuff before letting him mate with her. Edwin had picked up this girlfiend, somewhere in the city’s canal system, upon his escape from the Melancholia Arms, and together they had roamed the streets of Belle Grieve, looking for a nightly meal—but she had declined to
feast on Jean Lafitte. The Bruces dubbed this female gator "Edwina" and were petitioning to take her home with them; but, the future for gators as pets in Belle Grieve was looking grim—the city wanted to clean up the neighborhood to encourage tourism.

  One of the Bruces said: “No surprises, really. We took Edwin to a séance when we first got him; the medium told us he would die after meeting a live girl and a dead boy, within a day of each other. Looks like he found both and it did him in: he met this female gator, and then he feasted on poor little drowned Jean Lafitte, and it killed him.”

  Plans were underway to give Edwin a classic Jazz Funeral. I stood on the levee, as a late afternoon breeze broke up the humidity slightly. And, as the sun dipped below toward the horizon, I realized something awful: I was destined to write a New Orleans travel article without having mentioned “Etouffee,” the signature dish of the city, nor, for that matter, Huey Long, the famous populist state governor. Would my Belle Grieve chapter suffer, I wondered aloud?

  Colza stepped up. “I’m distantly related to Governor Long,” she said, helpfully, “and my three year old Calico is named Etoufee. So you’re covered.”

  She smiled, as only someone who had worked so hard to help revive a decrepit old district could; and I thanked her profusely for saving my travel story.

  “Of course,” she noted with a smirk, “my other cat is named ‘ANTI-CHRIST!’”

  A peel of thunder clapped above our heads, and with that, Colza stretched her arms outward, while her black cape caught the wind off the water, and she rose up in the air and flew away toward her Belle Grieve hostelry, and the eponymous cemetery.

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