Gone are the days when a decent happy hour meant $1 off bottled beer or some dregs-of-the-well concoction. Today’s happy hours are a cut above, pairing classic cocktails, craft beer, and wine specials with tasty, and often upscale small plates. No telling who is to thank for this trend, but there are plenty of reasons […]

Step inside Avo restaurant on Magazine Street on March 18 and you’ll find a St. Joseph’s Day altar laden with traditional Sicilian treats. Among them will be fig cookies prepared the way chef Nick Lama’s family has for generations.

The risotto at chef Nick Lama’s Uptown Italian restaurant is everything you could ask for…

Avo is an ambitious, modern Italian restaurant that feels authentic and personal and at the top of its game.

Nick Lama, chef and owner of Avo in New Orleans, shares seven simple recipes that anyone can make this holiday and all year long.

Avo named “Italian Restaurant of the Year” by New Orleans Magazine.

While Lama clearly honors his family’s Sicilian roots, his cooking at Avo borrows from all of Italy’s regional cuisines.

Nick Lama, a NOLA native and fourth-generation Sicilian, decided to open a gorgeous new Italian spot in its place.

Sicilian heritage and New Orleans cooking are so closely entwined that in some settings they’re practically one, and Nick Lama’s family roots reach deep into this tradition. But for his own first restaurant, Avo (5908 Magazine St., 504-509-6550; restaurantavo.com), the young chef is working from a different intersection than the familiar Creole-Italian. “My idea here […]

If you know Nick Lama, it’s probably for the young chef’s cooking at Gautreau’s, where he was Sue Zemanick’s chef de cuisine. The Lama name, however, has a long history in New Orleans. The Lamas held the lease on St. Roch Market until Katrina. They ran seafood restaurants around the area. In the video above, […]