Middendorf's Seafood Restaurant

Middendorf's Seafood Restaurant at 30160 US-51 in Manchac, Louisiana, sits on the edge of Lake Maurepas in the Manchac swamp, about fifty miles north of New Orleans, and has been serving catfish on this waterfront since 1934. Louis and Josie Middendorf opened the original roadhouse as a beer joint and family restaurant for travelers on the old highway connecting New Orleans to Baton Rouge. Their thin-fried catfish — catfish fillets pounded flat and fried in a cornmeal batter so thin it becomes more of a skin than a crust — became the signature preparation that made the restaurant a regional legend. The thinness of the fillet creates an unusually crisp result with an almost cracker-like texture, distinct from the thicker-cut catfish common elsewhere in the South. Softshell crab, fried shrimp, and onion rings round out a menu that has barely changed in decades and needs no changes — simplicity and consistency are the point. The dining room is a casual, wood-paneled lakeside hall with views over the water to the cypress trees and Spanish moss of the Manchac swamp. Pelicans and herons are regular visitors to the dock. The restaurant closes Monday and Tuesday. On weekends, particularly in spring and fall when the weather along the lakefront is mild, lines can be long. Cash is still preferred. The experience of eating thin-fried catfish while watching boats on the Manchac waterway is one of the most specifically Louisianan dining experiences available outside the major cities.