Up until this point, my dining experiences in New Orleans hadn’t been all that exciting. We ended up at fairly touristy places with good but not particularly great food. But then it all changed when we went to Cochon. We tried to go here on a Sunday night, but note to visitors, there are many restaurants that are closed on Sundays, including Cochon. It’s not anywhere near Bourbon street, which is a nice plus.The place is pretty big on the inside with a good sized bar. The kitchen is fairly open. I really dug the brick walls and all the pig art. This is a small plate kind of place, but they do have some entrees. And yes, there’s a lot of pig on the menu.
Some complimentary rolls served in a cute little bucket. These are super buttery and I’m sure, terrible for you.
Here we have the fried alligator with chili garlic aioli. Sure, it tastes like chicken, but like delicious and juicy chicken. These wood-fired roasted oysters were some of the best oysters I’ve ever had in my life. I don’t think I’ve ever had roasted oysters before. We ended up ordering more because we just had to!This was the deviled crab dip with butter crackers. This was good, but nothing great.Here are the fried boudin with pickled peppers. I’m not sure what these were supposed to taste like so I have no idea if these are good or not.The baked mac and cheese. Ok, this may be the best mac and cheese I’ve ever had. I couldn’t get enough.The spicy grilled pork ribs with watermelon pickle. These ribs were indeed spicy, and also sweet and tasty.  Here we have the very attractive braised country style rib with brown rice, pickled mushrooms, and beets. I liked everything about this, except for the pork. It was too porky. Do you know what I mean? But everything else was great.Here’s one of the entrees – the smoked beef brisket with horseradish potato salad.On to the desserts! The peanut butter cream pie with a big hunk taken out of it. Oh yeah, this was as good as you can imagine.The adorable Pineapple Upside-Down Cake with coconut-lime sorbet and dulce de leche. Yum.Finally, the Caramelized Apple Brioche with rum raisin ice cream. Also yum. We had a pretty big party and they were able to accommodate us with a long table in the front. The multitude of servers all kept our tummies full and our thirsts quenched. I would go back for the gator, oysters, and mac and cheese again and again. This is a must-stop!

We left Bend and headed to Crater Lake. After witnessing its freakin majestic beauty, we drove a long-ass way to the central Oregon coast, and landed in Bandon. It’s a cute little town with a little marina and old town area with a “boardwalk”. It’s seriously tiny, but adorable. After partaking of some delicious espresso stouts in our hotel room, we jaunted over to the old town area for some grub. We got a recommendation from the innkeeper to go to his favorite place, but alas, that place was closed on tuesdays. So this is how we ended up at the Wheelhouse Restaurant. Or were we in the Crowsnest Lounge? I’m not sure, but it’s the same place. One is upstairs, and one is downstairs.

We were upstairs, so you could get some nice views of the marina. Did I mention how cute this little town was? Seafood was to be had this evening, but first, we got some bread. Let me say this, they serve delicious sourdough bread here.

Both our entrees came with side salads, but J’s was much more fancy, with little shrimp, golden raisins, and sunflower seeds. He ordered a much fancier entree.

Mine was much more standard. No shrimp, golden raisins, or sunflower seeds for me, but instead, a couple of cherry tomatoes and a slice of cucumber. Hmm, I think he won. But, I absolutely loved my dressing. It was kind of like a runny catalina dressing, but with a bit of a spicy kick, as if it had chili powder in it. It’s hard to describe, but I definitely liked it. It was strange, but in a good way.

J got the big old halibut entree. Check out this beautifully grilled hunk of halibut with brown rice and veggies. No need to mess with any kind of sauce or anything on this. It was pure and unadulterated fish. And it was delicious.

I got the fish and chips, which was also made from the halibut. These huge honking hunks of fried goodness were hot, flaky, and delicious. And so were the fries! The service was good and our waitress was very nice and friendly. The food came out quickly, but then again, there weren’t too many people there that night. We both greatly enjoyed our halibut meals!

Wheelhouse Restaurant & Crows Nest Lounge
125 Chicago St
Bandon, OR 97411
(541) 347-9331my

Sometimes, going out to eat is too much. And so is cooking a meal. All I really want to do is some wine, cheese, grapes, and bread. And being in SF and being in the mission, that is all super easy to do. I skipped on over to Bi-Rite and picked up a loaf of acme sweet batard, and some hunks of manchego and brie. They didn’t have any grapes so I had to do some exploring. Everything place on 16th was either closed or just didn’t have grapes. So I ended up having to hoof it through a particularly scary part of mission and finally found some grapes at a sketchy produce store on mission near 18th. They were cheap and delicious. And we topped everything off with one of the several bottles of two buck chuck I picked up at trader joe’s. I love low key evenings like this…