By Jessica Pope
VALDOSTA — Situated at 205 N. Ashley St. in the historic downtown area of Valdosta, Antoine’s The Flavor of New Orleans was named 2009 Minority-Owned Business of the Year Thursday.
The award was presented to owner Brian Antoine by both the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce and the Lowndes County Black Business Association during the annual Salute to Minority-Owned Business Early Bird Breakfast. Nominees for the fourth annual award also included the Garden Villas Extended Stay Hotel & Suites and PeaceWay Counseling & Mediation Services Inc.
Antoine opened his Antoine’s The Flavor of New Orleans in Valdosta on Sept. 23, 2007.
“I am really happy with how the community has embraced us,” he was once quoted as saying in an issue of Valdosta Scene, a monthly magazine and a sister publication of The Valdosta Daily Times.
“I wanted to create a place that offered people a good time in a casual atmosphere at affordable prices, and I think I’ve done that.”
The sounds of a musical style that originated in the beginning of the 20th century in the Louisiana city of New Orleans emanate from his eatery in the historic downtown Valdosta area. Passersby in the 200 block of North Ashley Street find it
difficult to ignore the sounds, which are marked by a melodic freedom, polyphone ensemble playing, propulsive and intricate rhythms, improvisatory and virtuosic solos and a harmonic idiom ranging from a simple diatonicism through chromaticism to atonality.
In his restaurant, Antoine likes to keep the jazz playing from open to close. He only plays the best jazz New Orleans has to offer and believes it is the ideal accompaniment to his Cajun cuisine.
Before he opened the restaurant, Antoine worked for the United States Postal Service. He kicked off his 17-year career with mail while living in the city of New Orleans and ended it in Waycross in March 2007.
“That is when I seriously started to think about opening a restaurant,” he said.
Antoine and his wife, Donnata Antoine, relocated to Valdosta in August 2006, roughly one year after Hurricane Katrina. Although fortunate enough to rebuild their home, they were unable to continue working in their flood ravaged home city and were both offered opportunities to transfer to different locales by their respective employers.
Considering their options, the couple — she was a pharmacist in the United States Air Force — chose to start a new chapter of their life together in the city of Valdosta. He would drive the approximately 125-mile round-trip to and from Waycross nightly for the graveyard shift. She would be stationed at Moody Air Force Base.
Antoine spent his afternoons away from the Post Office driving around Valdosta and dreaming of opening his own restaurant, one that allowed him to share the best of his beloved New Orleans with his new friends and neighbors. In February 2007, he stumbled upon an empty building in downtown Valdosta.
“I found myself drawn to the old buildings,” he said. “They have such character and charm. Plus, I liked the fact that you could walk around the area. It just reminded me of the streets back home.”
With his wife’s support, Antoine quit his job with the Postal Service in March 2007 and took his time opening a restaurant that specialized in authentic Cajun cuisine. Inside the brick building, he worked to recreate the feel of a popular eatery on famous Bourbon Street, using a warm shade of gold on the walls, black on the ceiling and faux cobblestone on the floors. He hung Mardi Gras masks and beads, a few pictures depicting scenes from New Orleans, a Bourbon Street sign, a Naturally N’awlins sign and several fleurs-de-lis on the walls. He also installed a handmade bar and managed to use pieces of old windows and railings and more found damaged by Hurricane Katrina in his decor. He then pumped in the jazz music. He traveled to New Orleans several times when developing the menu for his Antoine’s The Flavor of New Orleans restaurant. He talked to restaurant owners and chefs, mastering the secrets of real Cajun cuisine, inventing several of his own recipes, including one for bread pudding with rum sauce, crawfish mashed potatoes and crab cakes.
“If the restaurant was not going to be done right, then it was not going to be done at all,” he said. “I wanted the experience to be as close to a night out in a restaurant in New Orleans as possible. It had to be the real deal ... the sights, sounds and flavors ... the food and the fun of New Orleans.”
The menu at Antoine’s The Flavor of New Orleans boasts seafood, chicken and sausage gumbo, a New Orleans favorite with French bread and white rice; red beans and rice with Andouille sausage, a New Orleans tradition, slow-cooked and flavorful; some shrimp and crawfish pasta; jambalaya, a Louisiana favorite with rice, chicken and sausage; a selection of beignets or French doughnuts; and much more.
To learn more about Antoine’s The Flavor of New Orleans, call the restaurant at (229) 241-9600. To learn more about the Minority-Owned Business of the Year Award, call the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce at (229) 247-8100.
