Middendorf’s Thin Catfish-Welcome to Louisiana

Ms. Mimi Sheraton does not list too many restaurants in her 1000 Foods to Eat Before You Die but Middendorf’s and their thin catfish is one.  I should first begin by saying that as a product of a Seattle upbringing complete with boat and a father who fished, anything less than halibut or salmon is really, typically, not considered worthy of notice (or eating).  Yet, I trust Mimi and when a colleague from work and I traveled to New Orleans for a conference, I talked Keri into (actually not difficult to do) into renting a car for a few hours and driving to Akers, Louisiana, about 30 miles north of the airport.  Middendorf’s has been in existence since 1934 and has been serving catfish since then. In that time, they must have figured out a winning combination (they have) as the place is immense and when we arrived at 8 pm on a Thursday, pretty darn full.  We arrived after sunset and they sit on a lake so I suspect the views would be pretty impressive, too. We missed the views but came in time for the catfish.

We tried a few winning things:  Italian oysters and crawfish cakes with remoulade sauce. (by the way, Remoulade sauce is included in Mimi’s book).  Both of these appetizers were fantastic. The sauce made the crawfish cakes which were full of whole crawfish and the oysters were topped with cheese, cream, butter, Italian breadcrumbs.  Altogether decedent and delicious.  We also ordered the seafood platter to share.  It isn’t that this was a bad plan but once you try the fried oysters or the thin catfish, it makes everything else on that platter (stuffed crab, fried shrimp, French fries) pale in comparison.  Eat the thin catfish and eat it FRIED.  They use the thinnest of almost a cornmeal-type batter (they sell the coating in the gift shop but do not specify what is in it) and the fish is so tender that you can almost “stretch” it by pulling on both sides of a piece. So, things considered, I am now a catfish fan as long as it is from Middendorf’s!