JACKSON GETS A TASTE OF NEW ORLEANS

When Nick Accardo bought the Whistle Stop Cafe recently, he brought a little of Louisiana to the city of Jackson.

A native of New Orleans who worked since childhood in Crescent City eateries including four- and five-star French and Italian restaurants, Accardo purchased the Whistle Stop about a month ago and began introducing Cajun and Italian entrees to the restaurant's menu.

The entrees proved so successful, he now offers a dinner menu and has expanded the number of entrees available to customers.

"This is just a start," Accardo explained in a drawl that dripped New Orleans. "I took the first step to see how the people in Jackson would like it."

Accardo said when he first purchased the Whistle Stop, located at the St. Louis Iron Mountain and Southern Railway Station in Jackson, the cafe's menu was based primarily on sandwiches and hamburgers and had a good lunch crowd.

However, having worked in upscale restaurants since childhood, Accardo wanted to add a few items to the menu that he enjoyed cooking, just to see how they would go over with the lunch crowd.

"I added red beans and rice, which is a New Orleans staple, and also added lasagna to the menu and during that first week, I sold about 90 percent sandwiches and 10 percent entrees," said Accardo.

"By the next week, word had gotten around and that went to about 50 percent entrees and 50 percent sandwiches."

Accardo said that as popularity for these first Cajun entrees grew, he introduced others. In addition to red beans and rice and lasagna, the Whistle Stop Cafe now offers a number of other entrees including shrimp jambalya, shrimp etouffee, seafood gumbo and shrimp scampi with ricotta cheese and wine sauce served over noodles.

The shrimp jambalaya, explained Accardo, was a favorite with those he worked with at Teen Challenge in Cape Girardeau.

Accardo is a 1991 Teen Challenge graduate and continued to work with the program on a full-time basis until February of this year. He said working as a member of the staff allowed him to further hone his cooking in the Teen Challenge kitchen. He continues to volunteer there.

While in New Orleans, he worked for such well-known restaurants as Jacques and the Sheraton. In addition to on-the-job training in these and other restaurants, Accardo attended sommelier school in order to become more familiar with wine and how it is served with and in food. While the Whistle Stop does not serve wine, Accardo says he does use it in a number of his recipes.

Now Accardo has expanded his entree offerings with a dinner menu and has begun to include salads with the price of entrees.

He says that people often become wary of Cajun cooking because many restaurants make their dishes hotter than most people care to eat. While he says the dishes he serves are spicy, they are not unbearably hot.

"A lot of restaurants make Cajun so hot that you can't taste the food," he said. "If you did that in New Orleans, you'd go out of business.

"I don't make food so hot that you can't taste it."

In addition to sandwiches and Cajun cuisine, the Whistle Stop Cafe offers a 1950s atmosphere with a jukebox playing '50s hits and waiters and waitresses dressed in bistro wear of the 1950s.

Accardo has changed the name of the restaurant to the Whistle Stop Cafe and Cajun Catering to reflect the catering arm of the business. He offers catering of Cajun foods in addition to restaurant service. Anyone interested in arranging for catering should phone Accardo at 243-8795.