Patois

There’s something timeless about this intimate white-cloth bistro uptown—a certain patina to Patois—that carries over to the menu as it reflects chef-partner Aaron Burgau’s immersion in the French roots of Creole cuisine. True, that reflection somehow flashes forward as often as back. For every dish of gulf fish almondine in citrus meunière, there’s another of Vietnamese caramel frog’s legs; for every sampler of boudin and rillettes, there’s a sweet-tea-brined and smoked pork chop with peach hot sauce and purple hull-pea hoppin’ john. Likewise, the savvy, super-cool wine selection’s bound to jazz the most jaded of grape geeks. Yet in the end, it all comes back to consummate Southern hospitality—say in the form of the wild-game sausages that Burgau, a hunter and fisherman, sometimes makes as a parting gift for special guests.