My friend, chef Lyle Broussard, has been asking me to come see him at Jack Daniel’s and have dinner. But my night time schedule is generally isolated to my and Chelsea’s date night, so we only get to try one new place a week.
Two weeks ago, we finally got to go see Lyle. I told him I didn’t want to order myself; I just wanted him to pick our menu for us, since I trusted him as an amazing chef.
Chef Lyle started out at L’Auberge at the same time my brother Marco did. Marco was the sous-chef at Le Café, and Lyle was the sous-chef at Jack Daniel’s. They shared the same kitchen.
Marco was always fond of chef Lyle, and always voiced his respect for the chef that Lyle is. I started to become closer with Lyle over the past couple of years as I started getting out more, and meeting with more and more chefs in this area.
My respect for his talents has grown as well. Chef Lyle has become the culinary face of L’Auberge, even if that wasn’t the intention. He was featured in Acadiana Magazine as one of the top chefs in this area. He also participated in the Louisiana Culinary Trails event, where he was a guest chef at Porter Ale House and Gastropub in Austin, Texas. He followed that up with a guest appearance on NBC’s Flip My Food with Chef Jeff.
Chef Lyle is from Louisiana, and his love for our culture and food comes out in every dish he makes. He’s such a humble man that all you want is for great things to happen for him. And by the looks of things, he is well on his way to becoming a chef to look out for.
OK, now, I don’t have many things I’m not a fan of when it comes to food, but oysters is one of them. And wouldn’t you know that the first thing chef Lyle sent out to us was his Char-broiled Oysters, which were topped with a Tasso butter that was made in-house.
My first reaction was a bit of an uneasy feeling, as I’ve had oysters more ways than I can count and have never enjoyed them. Chelsea had never had them at all.
We destroyed that plate of oysters. We both couldn’t get over how much flavor they had from the Tasso butter or the fact that the texture was perfect — not chewy at all, which has always been a quality about them I didn’t like.
I have no idea what was in the Tasso gravy other than the Tasso, but when you dipped the lump crab in it, it was the bomb.com.
We had had so much food that I chose to take this dish home. It reheated perfectly (in case you were curious).
Our entrée was a surf-n-turf that consisted of pecan and cracklin encrusted shrimp with a perfectly cooked “eye of ribeye,” two delish potato pancakes and some perfectly roasted vegetables that looked quite lovely on the plate. I really loved this dish, but the shrimp completely stole the spotlight, as I had never had anything like it before. The cracklins gave it a nice crunchiness that truly complemented the shrimp in the best possible way.
Lyle finished off our meal with an over-the-top spin on Banana’s Foster, which was the best ending to an absolutely perfect dining experience.
Chef Lyle came out and sat down with us, and we decided that he was going to prepare Marco’s food for his birthday dinner that we are having at Jack Daniel’s in December. Chef Lyle is a perfect ambassador for SWLA cuisine, and L’Auberge is lucky to have him. But I don’t get that this fact is lost on them. I’ve never been a fan of corporate chefs, as most large companies make chefs feel as if they’re replaceable and that there’s no real job security. But Chef Lyle has been with L’Auberge for almost a decade. It seems to me they really see his value, and have helped mold him. They’ve also given him freedom to travel to promote his food and talent — so for that I commend L’Auberge and Kerry Anderson.
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