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Even before people taste the first bite of food, the first sip of their drink or hear the band’s first note, early 20th Century atmosphere and big shade trees sell the experience at Caesar’s Salads Etc. and The Bar of DéNile restaurant in Ocean Springs.
Yup. It’s a long name, but a fun name and contrary to its implication that salads dominate the menu, they don’t.
Seared tuna in several forms is one of the most popular items sold, says General Manager David Noble. It comes in a wrap with crunchy noodles and pickled ginger, chili and wasabi ($9.50); as a salad with noodles and sesame ginger vinaigrette ($11.99), in a ciabatta bread sandwich with cucumber, onion and tomato ($9.99) or as an entree for $18,
“And we sell a lot of hamburgers and a lot of Reubens and muffulettas,” he says. “Since Day One, our salsa dip is consistently favored by the late night crowd.”
Though they shut down the menu around 8:30 to 10:30 p.m., a few foods including the salsa dip — sausage and cheese dip, the menu calls it, are available for the duration. Sometimes, that’s been 4:30 and 5 a.m.
We recently delighted in the tartness of an unusual appetizer of smoked Alaskan salmon that owner Laurie Authement said is her sister’s creation and incorporates lime, capers, cream cheese and onion on water crackers.
A lot of the foods served at Caesar’s come from Authement’s family’s recipes, “mainly her mom,” says Noble. “She‘s a really good cook.“
One of these is the very hardy chicken and sausage gumbo over rice in a serving size that’s enough for most any two average people.
The cooking is done by Noble and Authement and the artwork on the walls of the various dining rooms is primarily Noble’s paintings.
Customer demographics is across the board.
“We get a lot of seniors who love it here and come out and enjoy the music,” he says. “The big 21-to-32-year-old crowd is 70 percent of our business and during the daytime, we get local business people coming for lunch.”
Like Mary Mahoney’s Old French House restaurant in Biloxi, the main entrance is into the bar area, which spans the depth of the 85-plus-year-old house. Across this spacious area, an expansive backyard patio full of tables and chairs and a bandstand/stage can be seen through wide glass doors,
Outside, rotating bands perform Wednesday through Saturday nights, drawing as many as 200 people to the patio. With the advent of hot weather, Noble says, “This is when they start coming out. Winter is slow. Summer nights are cooler (than days) and we’ll have misters out there with the fan to keep people cooler.”
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