Disease Proof

This week Eating to Live on the Outside tangos with The Old Bay. The Old Bay serves up New Orleans inspired creations and, in this case, in all their unglory. Yeah, you guessed it. Its not good, but, we solider on—lets see what we got!

Oh boy. I don’t think the Natchitoches Beef Pies aren't going to cut it. Neither will the Gator Balls or the Three Cheese Baked Bread. Well, the only thing I see on the Sharing Plates that might work is the Wild Mushroom Mini Pizza Forestier. Yeah-yeah, I know what you’re saying, “PIZZA!” Relax, I’m ditching the cheddar cheese, but, I’m keeping the roasted red pepper sauce and the Criminni, Portobello, Shitake and Oyster mushrooms. So, with that being said, the only concession would be the pizza dough. I’m not thrilled about it, but its cool.

Alright, the soups and the classic Cajun dishes aren’t looking good, so I’m skipping over that section of the menu—onto the rest of the main dishes! Okay, the only thing I see—and this is a big concession—is the Vegetarian Zucchini Boat. What is it? Brace yourself. It’s a seedless zucchini “boat” corn floured, fried, stuffed with ratatouille, surrounded by long grain rice, and smothered in a roasted vegetable sauce. Now, this thing has a lot strikes, but maybe if the sun, the moon, and the stars are in line, you might be willing to make this concession. Personally, I wouldn’t. The misgivings with this veggie dish is obviously the frying and any cheese or dairy products that might be used in the ratatouille or sauce. If it turns out its dairy-free and you can deal with the frying. It’s an option, albeit a bad one.

Now, the steaks are next—and we’re done! Moving on. The next viable menu items are the salads, again, no surprises here. You’ve got two options: the Garden Salad of Mixed Greens and Caesar Salad. The Caesar Salad is a big waste of time. I never bother trying to futz with Caesar salads, especially in the face of a house salad. In the case of The Old Bay the garden salad comes with mixed leaf greens, grape tomatoes, carrots, and mushrooms, and your choice of dressing. As always, if you limit or omit the dressing you’ve got a great meal here and possibly concession-free—hard to argue with that!

Okay, confession time. I’ve actually eaten at The Old Bay. So, what did I ordered? Drum-roll please, actually it’s not that dramatic. I had the Garden Salad with a teeny-tiny amount of balsamic vinaigrette. It was pretty good. It’s hard to muck up a salad. My friend I was eating with—she is not an Eat to Liver—ordered the Wild Mushroom Mini Pizza and the Fried Calamari Creole. Now, she ordered the pizza with the cheese, so I didn’t touch it, but it did look good and without cheese I think it’d still be very tasty. I don’t need to talk about the fried calamari do I?

Well, there it is. Eating to Live on the Outside Cajun-style. I’m sure a Cajun restaurant in New Jersey isn’t the best representation of Creole cooking, so maybe it is a lot better than this, but as far as The Old Bay is concerned I doubt it’ll become a hotspot for Eat to Livers. But what do you think? Check out The Old Bay’s menu and let me know how you handle Eating to Live on the Outside. Make a comment or send an email to diseaseproof@gmail.com. Until then, eat well. Peace!