Published: January 02, 2008 03:02 pm         

Antoine's Flavor of New Orleans

The sounds of a musical style that originated in the beginning of the 20th century in the Louisiana city of New Orleans emanate from an eatery in the historic downtown Valdosta area. Passersby in the 200 block of North Ashley Street find it difficult to ignore the sounds, which are marked by a melodic freedom, polyphone ensemble playing, propulsive and intricate rhythms, improvisatory and virtuosic solos and a harmonic idiom ranging from a simple diatonicism through chromaticism to atonality.

Jazz.

In his 2-plus-month-old restaurant, Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans, Brian Antoine likes to keep the jazz playing from open to close. He only plays the best jazz New Orleans has to offer and believes it is the ideal accompaniment to his Cajun cuisine.

Before he opened up Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans, Brian worked for the United States Postal Service. He kicked off his 17-year career with mail while a resident of New Orleans and ended it in Waycross in March 2007.

“That is when I seriously started to think about opening a restaurant,” he said.

Brian and his wife, Donnata Antoine, relocated to Valdosta in August 2006, roughly a year after the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe. Although fortunate enough to rebuild their home, they were unable to continue working in their flood ravaged home city and were both offered the opportunity to transfer to different locales by their respective employers.

Considering their options, Brian and Donnata, a pharmacist in the United States Air Force, decided to start a new chapter of their life together in the city of Valdosta. He would drive the approximately 125-mile round-trip to and from Waycross nightly for the graveyard shift. She would be stationed at Moody Air Force Base.

Brian spent his afternoons away from the Postal Service driving around Valdosta and dreaming of opening his own restaurant, one that allowed him to share the best of his beloved New Orleans with his new friends and neighbors. In February 2007, he stumbled upon an empty building at 205 North Ashley Street in historic downtown Valdosta.

“I found myself drawn to the old buildings,” he said. “They have such character and charm. Plus, I liked the fact that you could walk around the area. It just reminded me of the streets back home.”

With his wife’s support, Brian terminated his job with the Postal Service in March 2007 and took his time opening a restaurant specializing in authentic Cajun cuisine. Inside the brick building, he worked to recreate the feel of a popular eatery on famous Bourbon Street, using a warm shade of gold on the walls, black on the ceiling and faux cobblestone on the floors. He hung Mardi Gras masks and beads, a few pictures depicting scenes from New Orleans, a Bourbon Street sign, a Naturally N’awlins sign and several fleurs-de-lis on the walls. He also installed a handmade bar and managed to use pieces of old windows and railings and more found damaged by Hurricane Katrina in his decor. He then pumped in the jazz music.

Brian traveled to New Orleans several times when developing the menu for his Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans restaurant. He talked to restaurant owners and chefs and mastered the secrets of real Cajun cuisine and even invented a few of his own recipes, including one for bread pudding with rum sauce, crawfish mashed potatoes and crab cakes.

“If the restaurant was not going to be done right, then it was not going to be done at all,” he said. “I wanted the experience to be as close to a night out in a restaurant in New Orleans as possible. It had to be the real deal ... the sights, the sounds and the flavors ... the food and the fun of New Orleans.”

Guests of all ages of Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans might start their lunch of dinner off with one of a host of appetizers. Favorites include the crawfish (spicy boiled crawfish served by the pound with spicy potatoes and corn) and the jazzy wings (his version of buffalo wings tossed in Cajun seasoning and served with bleu cheese dressing and celery). Those 21 years of age and older who prefer to kick off their afternoon or evening on the town with a drink from the bar might order New Orleans’ most famous cocktail, The Hurricane, or The St. Charles, often described as a “not your garden-variety gin and tonic.”

The menu at Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans also boasts seafood, chicken and sausage gumbo, a New Orleans favorite with French bread and white rice; red beans and rice with Andouille sausage, a New Orleans tradition, slow-cooked and flavorful; shrimp and crawfish pasta; jambalaya, a Louisiana favorite with rice, chicken and sausage; a Cajun ribeye served with crawfish mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables; shrimp, oyster, ham and cheese, hot sausage or roast beef po boys; and beignets or French doughnuts. There are even a few selections for the little ones, like a fried chicken drumstick, a hamburger, fried shrimp or catfish.

“I am really happy with how the community has embraced us,” Brian said. “I wanted to create a place that offered people a good time in a casual atmosphere at affordable prices, and I think I’ve done that.”

As one of the customers of Antoine’s Flavor of New Orleans recently told Brian, “New Orleans’ loss is Valdosta’s gain.”