New Venezuelan Restaurant.
Mrs. King and I went to Origen for lunch yesterday. It is on St. Claude Avenue, in the Bywater.
Origen is in a storefront in half of a double on St. Claude. It is where the former, short-lived Luna Libra taco joint was a couple months ago. The sign is graphically strong, so it attracts attention, otherwise, you would drive by without noticing just another building on St. Claude. It looks much nicer now, more chic than it did when it was Luna Libra.
Walking in the corner front door, one enters a surprisingly fern bar-like environment.
We are in the Bywater.
We do not regularly see people in black and white anymore. I am thinking this because I am watching a young Frank Sinatra croon in a short film co-starring the dead end kids. It happens to be playing as I type this. The sound is off. He looks like an angel.
There are few fern bars in the world, and even fewer Venezuelan restaurants in New Orleans. “What is Venezuelan food like?” Everybody asks me. Until yesterday, all I could answer was, ““I’ll tell you when I find out.”
Venezuelan food is surprisingly expensive.
What you are paying for is presentation.
Everything is very stylish and short staffed. They are still working out the kinks. Being short staffed, it may take awhile but they are trying.
Mrs. King and I both agreed we would like to come back for dinner. I can justify the prices for dinner but not for lunch. The menu is the same. I do not want dinner for lunch.
Service is at Bywater levels. The host, maybe he is the owner, he put a jar of hot sauce on the table, saying it was his grandmother’s recipe. Nice touch. It was onions pickled in peppered vinegar. It was delicious. The sauce you could spoon on or over your dish was the vinegar. It was not fiery but it has a bite going down. It is colorless.
After lunch, fully satisfied and duly impressed, Mrs. King and I did something else. I forget what it was. When you live in a kaleidoscope of a city, one thing bleeds into the next.
I remember. We went to Jackson Square. We had our palms read. We went to Jackson Square and had our palms read because, you know, that is what people who live here do all the time.