St. Charles Avenue Magazine Food Column, August, 2003
By Michael Depp

Summer inevitably draws us to water, and most of us have summertime memories of cooler refuge at the water's edge - the lake, the Gulf, the bay or ocean - and with it the simple foods often enjoyed there.

For me, it's baked clams and fried clam strips on the waterfront in Port Jefferson, N.Y., where I would sit outside at picnic tables and watch cars squeeze into the yawning mouth of the ferry that would take them across the Long Island Sound to Connecticut. Since living here, the closest match for me has been the lakefront with its string of fried fish joints and sailboats dotting the horizon line. It's a great place for summer comfort food, but surely not the province of fine dining, right?

Well that was until Tom Wolfe set up shop with his eponymous restaurant three years ago. No, this isn't the Tom Wolfe of Bonfire of the Vanities fame, and you won't find him wearing white suits and spats. Our man here is a boyish and energetic chef who has flown a little too low under the radar considering the scope and depth of his talent. But that's because while most of the city's more ambitious restaurants usually spring up in the Downtown or Uptown areas, he has been - forgive me for the dreadful but unavoidable pun - the lone Wolfe on the lakefront.

"My biggest challenge has been getting recognized and getting tourists to make the 10-minute ride from downtown," he says, noting that most of his diners are locals who've remained loyal regulars.

Wolfe's attachment to the lakefront, however, ties back to his parents. His father grew up along the lake, and, in an odd twist of fate, used to play in one of Wolfe's current dining rooms (his restaurant is a converted house where one of his father's friends lived as a boy). It also connects him to memories of his grandmother's kitchen, where he spent his boyhood years inadvertently picking up a respect for food through her everything-from-scratch philosophy of cooking.

Wolfe trained at Delgado's culinary school and did an early stint at Mr. B's Bistro under Gerard Maras' direction (these were early days when Peristyle's Anne Kearney and Bacco's Haley Gable, having just come to town, were working side-by-side with him). But it was his jump over to Emeril's, where he soon worked his way up to sous chef in those halcyon days of Lagasse's empire building, where Wolfe really began to define and hone his style.

"It was very exhilarating," he says. "There was so much excitement, so much energy and nervousness. The tasks that came through him were pretty incredible."

Wolfe especially took to Emeril's proclivity for pairing the rustic with the refined, a principle he carried over to his own restaurant three years ago. But to that, he's added his own unabashed embrace of unapologetically big flavors. "I'm for pronounced flavors," he says. "I don't believe in a dot of this or a dot of that."

This thought finds no better articulation than in his cane syrup slow roasted duck, which he serves with foie gras-stuffed sweet potatoes (themselves crusted in apple chips) along with a confit onion-goat cheese beggar's purse. The contrasts are surprisingly intricate for such a lusty dish, which, were it the only thing on his menu, would make Wolfe's a worthy destination.

Wolfe also has a great affection for panko (and who among us does not share this love?), which turns up effectively in his panko-crusted redfish with smoked Gouda cheese veloute, one of the most popular dishes among his regulars. Among his more eyebrow-raising offerings, meanwhile, are the garlic crusted oyster nachos, which are topped with spicy mirliton strings and epitomize his boldness, but also his accessibility. Just a bite is enough to put you very comfortably in his groove.

I could wax poetic about the rest of his menu - the rich Cubano sandwich, the inimitable white chocolate butter bars for dessert - but the more I enumerate his dishes, the more it becomes clear to me that Wolfe's is ultimately about its own addictive brand of comfort food, albeit with a fine dining twist. First-time diners might turn up at his door with no small amount of skepticism about the locale, but in the end it makes a kind of perfect sense because Wolfe has forged a style that leaves a permanent impression and spikes a wistful kind of hunger when it's recalled. Which is what good food by the water, particularly in the throes of summertime, is really all about.

Tom Wolfe's Louisiana Poached Oysters in White Wine Cream Sauce with Fried Parsley and Parmesan Cheese

Melt:
4 tsp. Of butter in a hot sauté pan

Sauté:
4 tsp. Shallots (minced)
2 tsp. Chopped garlic
8 tbsp. Chopped parsley
(sauté 3 minutes)

Deglaze with:
1 cup white wine (Chardonnay or Chablis)

Add:
4 cups heavy whipping cream

Then add:
12 tbsp. Oyster liquor (strain first)
24 shucked oysters (no shells)

Season with:
Kosher salt to taste
Table ground black pepper to taste

Cook oysters until fins curl (approximately 2-3 minutes) and toss with 3 cups cooked pasta. Garnish with sprigs of fried parsley and grated Parmesan cheese.