New Orleans Mother's Restaurant
Big Easy Institution Offers Po-Boys, "Debris" and Home-Style Cooking
For 70 years Mother's has been a favorite of longshoremen, reporters, attorneys, conventioneers, secretaries and mothers, too, though not necessarily on Mother's Day.
Mother’s Restaurant in New Orleans is probably not the ideal place to take Mother on Mother’s Day, but chances are she would enjoy the visit other days of the year. Thousands do.
It’s been in an old downtown brick building since 1938, serving a clientele that has varied from Mississippi River longshoremen and newspaper reporters to convention delegates, attorneys and office secretaries.
The 70-year-old restaurant is a New Orleans institution patronized by both natives and tourists, who often line up on the sidewalk just to get in. Part of its fame is due to its original proximity to The Times-Picayune and New Orleans States newspapers. In its early years, the restaurant was a favorite eating place for the papers’ editors and reporters, who spread the word about its New Orleans home style cooking.
The Picayune moved away and the States has died, but Mother’s has continued to thrive. It has done so under three different ownerships by sticking to some of the recipes and cooking style introduced by its namesake, Mary "Mother" Landry and her husband, Simon Landry.
Tourists Flock In From Nearby Convention Center and Hotels
It has also benefited from the neighbors who have moved into the area, including the Morial Convention Center, the Hilton and several other hotels, the Riverwalk shopping center and federal buildings. Now Donald Trump plans to erect a major tower within a block of Mother’s.
The logo on the restaurant website modestly says Mother's has "the world’s best baked ham." The ham is crucial to many of its favorite offerings, including its ham po-boys and its Ferdi Special, a po-boy sandwich made of baked ham, roast beef, Mother’s "debris", shredded cabbage (instead of lettuce), pickles, mayonnaise, Creole mustard and yellow mustard.
The rendered pork fat from the baked ham (a substitute for butter) is used to make Mother’s roux, a basic ingredient for many of its "home-cooked" specials. The specials include shrimp jambalaya, red beans and rice, gumbo, a seafood platter, a softshell crab platter and a dish called "baked spaghetti pie," which is served with black eye peas, rice, green beans and potatoes.
Ferdi Special Features Roast Beef "Debris" from the Gravy
Another signature ingredient at Mother’s is its "debris," the roast beef pieces that fall into the gravy while baking in the oven. After being requested by enough customers, the debris became part of the Ferdie Special, which is named for a customer.
Mother’s is no place to diet and neither is it the most elegant spot in town. The dining rooms in the old brick building on Poydras and Tchoupitoulas streets are crowded with too many customers and tables. Service is cafeteria style. The old walls are cluttered with signs, family pictures and newspaper clippings. Zagat reviews go from one extreme to another, but most are very favorable.
Like the restaurant, the staff is loud. But as in many New Orleans restaurants, employees often address customers as "honey," "sweetheart" or "darling."
Five Landry Marines Turned Mother's into "TUN Tavern"
The restaurant is also filled with reminders of the U.S. Marine Corps. Five of the Landry offspring served as Marines, including their daughter, who was the first Louisiana female accepted into the Corps. The restaurant became such a Marine hangout in the 1960s that it was called "TUN Tavern" after the Revolutionary War tavern that was the birthplace of the Marines.
Jacques and Eddie Landry took over the restaurant from their parents and sold it in 1986 to Jerry and John Amato. The Amatos expanded the menu but retained the Landry flavor and the restaurant’s traditional style.
Sources: The Times-Picayune, August 14, 2001; Mother's Restaurant website, restaurant visits, Zagat 2007 & 2008
