For Antoine’s Restaurant, the oldest restaurant in New Orleans, 2015 marks its 175th birthday. And, naturally, events and promotions will unfold through the year tied to its long history and deep well of tradition. But, even as it celebrates its past, Antoine’s is also using this anniversary to introduce changes that are aimed squarely at the future, and even at its very survival.
Taken on their own, the changes aren’t exactly sweeping. Antoine’s will still look and taste like Antoine’s. But these changes are aligned with an internal campaign at Antoine’s that’s been gaining momentum for years now, one intended to make a restaurant that embodies traditional old-line French Creole dining more accessible to potential customers, even as tastes change and competition grows.
So now there’s a redesigned menu, with a handful of new dishes, with signature drinks and with an overall new look intended to be more user-friendly for those not already acquainted with oysters Foch, soufflé potatoes, chicken Rochambeau and other Antoine’s staples.
Some presentations on the plate have changed too, though not the recipes themselves — most of which relate to a very old mode of Creole cuisine, many of which were created by Antoine’s chefs through the generations and some of which can seem like fusty museum pieces from the vault of dining in days past.
These changes come as Antoine’s has also pursued a more modern marketing edge. Yes, Antoine’s has a Facebook page, and now a social media manager. It also adopted an online reservation system — a big shift at a restaurant where regulars often request reservations directly through their accustomed waiters instead of the front desk.
This would all be business as usual at most restaurants. But Antoine’s is treasured by its regulars for the ways it is unlike most modern restaurants, and so the changes have entailed a delicate, sometimes fraught balancing act of preservation and evolution.
That’s been going on for a while now. A different branch of the family owners of Antoine’s took the reigns here just before Hurricane Katrina, then spent the first few years after the storm trying to get back to normal. But normal, as it had been defined at Antoine’s, was not going to cut it.
The restaurant may be proud that its dishes correspond with a bygone era, but so did many of the operations and business practices behind the scenes. So, the task for the new guard at the helm has been to try to separate what is truly essential to the identity of Antoine’s and what is eligible for change.
That dials up some complex assessments that go beyond restaurant trends and require the navigation of the touchstones beloved by Antoine’s loyalists, the logistics of running a business in the modern era and the onus of enticing new customers not already emotionally invested in its traditions.
It sounds like a tall order. But as Antoine’s rounds the corner to 175 years, that’s the job the restaurant has undertaken to make sure those anniversaries keep coming.
Antoine’s Restaurant
713 St. Louis St., New Orleans, 504-581-4422; www.antoines.com
