At Dunbar’s new location inside Loyola’s Broadway Activity Center, you’re not likely to see a meeting of officers from Zulu. And at the original location on Freret, I don’t remember booths wired with Ethernet jacks or law journals stacked next to the trays.It’s strictly cafeteria service now, so the motherly waitresses no longer walk the floor, cajoling guests into a second, or even a third, plate of fried chicken.
One thing hasn’t changed: no one leaves Dunbar’s hungry.
If they priced the food by the pound, it could be the most expensive restaurant in town. Instead, for well under 10 dollars you get a tray weighed down with catfish, red beans with fried dark meat chicken or a bowl of dark gumbo full of chicken, andouille and gumbo crabs.
A few items match my memories of the original Dunbar’s, but the greens and the red beans fell flat. Signs warning that neither have meat should have been my hint to order something else. A little pickled pork would have made the all the difference, but I suppose that Dunbar’s has to make sure that even students avoiding meat can still eat lunch.
Most of the food waits in steam trays, including jambalaya, bell pepper stuffing and the sweet potatoes glazed with molasses and spiced with cinnamon. Every fried item, however, is made to order and well worth the 10-minute wait. My plate of dark meat chicken arrived fresh from the fryer. As I broke through the crisp skin and bit into the well-brined meat, a wave of steam momentarily fogged my glasses.
A meal at Dunbar’s has plenty of sugary things before you reach dessert. The delicious sweet potatoes. Iced tea sweeter than a snowball. And what they call cornbread, although I’d swear it’s actually a pound cake masking for Mardi Gras as cornbread. If your sweet tooth still hasn’t been satisfied, don’t miss the miniature pecan and sweet potato pies.
When word gets out about this fine school cafeteria, look for the enrollment at Loyola to double.
501 Pine St., 861-5451, Mon-Fri 7 a.m.-7 p.m.
