Welcome to the Fire & Ice Cajun/Creole Café

Right now I'm at the Fire and Ice Café eating some of the best beans and rice I've ever had, waiting for my gumbo. The beans are thick-skinned and tender-cooked, the gravy rich and smoky, the rice is light and separate; the garlic, onion, paprika, cayenne pepper, Andouille sausage and the bacon chunks all combine with force. My face is sweating from the hot sauce I've added from a bottle with a picture on it of an open-mouthed scream. The flavors, aroma and décor saturate the moment with some real but incomprehensible significance. I no longer care that the food came in a paper container. The lightbulbs are slowly growing shaggy halos...

I'm losing it. I know the signs; I've lost it before. I'm half-glad there aren't any other diners here. They'd take one look at my strange expression, and either recoil in that kind of horror unique to squares, or just smile and nod like conspirators.

I can't believe this place isn't packed. The food is unique and built from scratch, the atmosphere is quirky, the owner/operators are friendly and chatty, and most importantly, no entrée costs more than $8.95. But then again, it's easily overlooked. It's not in midtown or downtown, and it's not advertised except in the yellow pages.

This café’s owners also own the beauty salon next door, making the restaurant seem a little like a passionate hobby for them. Fire and Ice Cafe has the laid-back feel of a friend's kitchen, and the hours seem more appropriate for the salon next door than for a restaurant. The service is polite, and there is concern for the customer, but in a very interactive kind of way. If you want something, you've got to speak up, and you might, depending on your attitude, have to get it yourself. The entrées change daily, and the food and ice cream specials are so full of variety that they are a bit unpredictable.

Suddenly, a young lady walks in through the salon's adjoining door with a disembodied plastic head and several questions for the chef. He abruptly shifts from talking about spices and meats to oblique-pattern haircuts and curler density. I feel like I'm in a well-catered surrealist movie. The owners' daughter takes a break from her homework and brings my entrées. I'm glad because my buzz from the beans and rice is almost gone.

There is an artistic swirl of hot sauce on the rim of the two pristine ceramic bowls - one Gumbo Lafitte ($8.95), and one Fat Tuesday Creole ($6.95 both with beans and rice and cornbread). The Creole is every bit as boisterous and extravagant as the holiday it's named for. It has nearly everything in the kitchen in it - tender pork and shrimp, Andouille sausage, chicken, celery, onions, peppers and stewed tomatoes. I can't tell what the spices are, and the tight-lipped menu says, "Cajun spices." The sum-total isn't spicy-hot, but gigantic, almost like it won't fit completely in my mouth, like I could keep this one bite in my mouth all through Lent and have flavor to spare.

I finish as much Creole as I can and take a big whiff of the Gumbo Lafitte. I can feel sweat break out inside my nose. I can tell immediately that this is the real deal. The dish is named for the Pirate Lafitte, a gentleman pirate who raided vessels in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. To mimic Lafitte's Caribbean lifestyle, this gumbo has Mangos and tamarinds in it (in addition to shrimp, chicken, Andouille sausage, celery, peppers and onions) and is finished off with brandy-soaked croutons. The fruit backs the heat in an interesting way, providing an unexpected sweet lushness and an occasional tangy citrus note. I want a cutlass and a moustache to twirl.

Eating bite after bite of this concoction slowly tears me from ordinary modes of taste and smell. I think I've been using my nose and mouth half-assedly my whole life. The cayenne heat wasn't evident in the first bite, but now I wish I had some French bread to soothe the intensity - and to wipe the bowl clean. The chef tells me that it's a two on a scale of ten. I think I'm beginning to sweat on the inside. The colors are swirling again. I might never eat a boiled potato again. I think I can hear the way this food tastes.

The creative entrees, the way the air is filled with aromas I can't quite place, the hot sauce I think I've overdosed on - everything makes me dizzy. I imagine the chef in the kitchen hunched over a Voodoo doll, sticking peppers into its mouth, packing it with Andouille sausage, and sprinkling it with a mysterious Cajun melange. I know I can fly. Crazy mad colors everywhere, gaslight at the end of the table, Ladybug sculpture telling me to order more gumbo, beads, purple and green; coins, silver and gold. I swear I can hear that accordion play even though it's just hanging on the wall. I've got a spicy monkey on my back. Screw angel dust; give me gumbo.

- Scott Woodham

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February 13, 2006
Fire and Ice
401 W. International Airport Road in Anchorage

Where else but Alaska can you find a combination Cajun/Creole café, hair salon, beauty school AND tanning salon? This place has it all and is hands down the most interesting establishment the Krewe du Review has visited to date. We had swung by the restaurant several times before, hoping to try their gumbo. Gumbo is only served on weekdays, so we picked some up as take out (smoked pork and alligator sausage) to share with the Krewe on a Saturday afternoon.

Alligator gumbo sounded a little scary, but our fears were allayed with our first bite. The broth was thick, dark and creamy with a great smoky flavor. We closely examined the alligator sausage---it tasted good but to be quite honest I wouldn't have guessed it contained reptile meat. Peppers, celery and onion were plentiful and the spicing was a little different but great. The menu notes that they like to be creative with their spices. I guess if they can be "creative" with hair-dos they can certainly take an artistic turn with their cooking, too! The meal came with a good little corn muffin and a side of red beans and rice. The red beans were kidney beans, not my favorite, and were spiced quite differently-lots of cumin and spices that I couldn't quite determine.

On the following weekend, we were able to visit the restaurant for a sit down meal. When we had popped in before (yes, the Krewe has done a lot of scouting out of restaurants around town), we had always seen a colorful fellow with curly gray hair and a groovy crocheted hat, involved in lively conversation in one of the booths. There he was again, and we learned that he was Sigel, the owner and cook (plus beautician and beauty school instructor). In this visit, he was helping his daughter Aly (the waitress) with her studies (yep, they home school right there in the restaurant), and assisted a few young women studying beauty school stuff. Aly took our orders and talked with us about learning to play the piano, viola, accordion and guitar-all of the instruments are sitting out, ready to play when the spirit moves. Steve and I ordered sandwiches, a Creole dip and a jambalaya sandwich.

While waiting we explored the restaurant-there's lots to look at. The walls are painted in bright, bold Mardi Gras colors, and there are five roomy booths. A long table runs the length of the room with colorful outdoor umbrellas perched above it. The table was jam packed with different beauty supplies that looked like someone was labeling or sorting. Each booth has a large, glass topped table, and underneath the glass are all sorts of Mardi Gras and New Orleans memorabilia-"throws" of all sorts, beads, coins, photos and prints of New Orleans scenes, travel brochures, restaurant menus and matchbooks from Louisiana, etc. Beads, masks, pictures and original art adorn the walls. A large wirework alligator hangs on the wall near the doorway, and we counted at least three REAL dried alligator heads here and there. One particularly festive one held their business cards and loads of Mardi Gras beads. A wire shelving unit holds large jars of pickled okra and Café du Monde coffee cups. Odd items are stacked or hung here and there.

When there was a break in the action, Sigel came over to chat with us. He talked about how he and his wife Sue had started the restaurant. They had moved to Anchorage from Seattle where they had both worked in the beauty industry and he had done professional cooking. Upon arriving here they began to miss one of their favorite restaurants, one that served Cajun and Creole food. When a space became available next to their salon they decided to start up a restaurant of their own and cook the food they love-Cajun ("Fire") and homemade ice cream ("Ice").

Sigel brought out a few delicious pieces of confection for us to try, "it's something we're playing with". The squares were made of fudge, malted milk, pecans and Grand Marnier-WOW! About then Aly brought out our sandwiches. Steve's Creole dip was a meaty roast beef sandwich with melted gouda cheese. Mine was jambalaya, topped with melted gouda cheese on a toasted hoagy roll-it was spicy and good, and Steve kept wanting more "tastes" of it. Get your own buddy!

We decided that we couldn't do a full restaurant review without sampling the ice cream too. Steve tried the coconut jam ice cream, loaded with tiny chocolate chips and coconut. I tried the "shipwreck" which was a combination of cocoanut, mango, guava and other tropical fruits. Both flavors of ice cream were out of this world good. All of the ice cream is made fresh at the restaurant, and Sigel showed us the machine he uses. He also talked to us about how he juggles starting up his roux in the mornings (he uses rice cookers!) and gets the salon up and running. About then a pleasant young woman came in to tell Sigel that his beauty shop customer was ready for her color. He laughed, bid us adieu and zoomed off to the salon. Sue, Sigel's wife, took us into the shop to show us around a bit and to take our payment at the cash register. One wall of chairs was filled with teen girls waiting to get their hair done for the prom that night. What an adventure! We plan to go back for the "surfin' gator-doggie", gator sausage with gouda, red beans and gumbo---now that's getting creative!