I'll take breakfast at the Camelia over Brennan's any day of the week! I did Brennan's once - nothing special except the $$$$.
I couldn't agree more about Brennan's, and any of the Brennan family "chain." None of the family, except Dickie, to my knowledge knows one end of a fry pan from the other. They target the tourist, not the natives, although a couple of years before the storm, Commander's did send out a "private" number for reservations by locals. Once before that notice when some relatives were in town and nothing would do but Commander's, I called for 7p resesrvations, and they said the earliest was 8:30p--so I took it bc of the insistence of the relatives. Then, when they asked for a 'local" phone, they said, "What hotel is that?" "No hotel," said I, "that's my home just a few blocks from you." Then it was, "Let me check, I think we may have a table at 7p." Nice, but that's not the way to treat the public. The food is mediocre when compared to our other "white table cloth" restaurants. And Emeril has gone totally tourista too, he's rarely at his restaurants, the food is pedestrian, and over priced. He was the first to ask 6 times the retail price for wines--really a rip off.
Real New Orleans food is all over the place, but they don't advertise generally to the tourist, they serve in the leasurely way we like to eat--2 hours or more isn't unusual for dinner--and cook it seasoned the real way, some spicey some sophisticated, all delicious. Everything isn't meant to have high spice "heat" but when it's done right, it's a party in the mouth.
