Cane & Table, the Cuban meets Cajun concept restaurant and bar from Neal Bodenheimer, Kirk Estopinal and Alfredo Nogueira, hits a milestone as it celebrates 10 years in business. With its rum-forward cocktail menu with tropical inspiration and innovative menu from Chef Nogueira, Cane & Table regularly finds itself on “Best Of” lists for food and drinks and has won awards including being named one of the “Five Best New Cocktail Bars in America” by Bon Appétit; one of the best bars in America by Food & Wine; and was most recently featured in The New York Times’ guide: “The 25 Best Restaurants in New Orleans Right Now.”

Jerk Pork Chop. Photo courtesy of Cane & Table.

Cane & Table comes from the same team as Cure, the stand-alone cocktail bar on Freret Street that changed how New Orleanians enjoy cocktails. Neal Bodenheimer, Kirk Estopinal, and then-owner Nick Detrich found the location for Cane & Table, a cozy French Quarter space that used to be home to the bar, Pravda, and formulated a plan that went through a few changes before the team put a focus on its innovative menu.

“The original idea was a tiki thing,” Kirk Estopinal said. “For a year we ran a tiki-style situation while we worked on the building and settled on a final concept.”

Cane & Table opened with the idea of a ’60s-style tiki vibe with an American Chinese and Polynesian-inspired food menu. Ditching the tiki idea, the team created a rum-focused space with finely crafted cocktails that fit the New Orleans Caribbean spirit. With the help of The Company Burger’s Adam Biderman, the menu took shape with food from South and Central America and Cuba.

“The menu started fitting in with more of the rum-forward direction of the bar itself,” Estopinal explained. “We settled on the name ‘Cane & Table’ as a nod to being a rum bar that serves food. We wanted to open something with a classic feel that could be around in 100 years.”

When Detrich left Cane & Table in 2017, the team welcomed chef Alfredo Nogueira, who has taken care in crafting the restaurant’s current menu. Lifelong friends, Estopinal jumped at the opportunity to add Nogueira to the Cane & Table family.

He explained, “I always wanted to get Alfredo in on the ownership and I think it’s important as a restaurant team to have someone that knows food. We know drinks really well, but I don’t have the desire to run a kitchen. It’s been great to have Alfredo on board.”

Zarzuela de Mariscos. Photo courtesy of Cane & Table.

More than just a bar, Estopinal says the focus on the food here is equally as important as the cocktails. In the restaurant’s beginning stages, he explains, the public didn’t know what to make of Cane & Table’s food because it lacked one clear concept—instead pulling inspiration from different cultures with selections that Estopinal admits were “scatterbrained.” Ten years in, however, Cane & Table has found its footing in the New Orleans restaurant scene with Chef Nogueira’s menu, inspired by the chef’s Cuban-New Orleans heritage.

Menu selections are seasonal and include Zarzuela De Mariscos, clams, gulf shrimp, drum, tomato-saffron broth and Bellegarde sourdough; Fish Rundown, fried drum, lump crab, coconut curry, Jazzmen rice; Arroz Con Pollo, roasted chicken, and saffron bomba rice; Grilled Octopus, kalamata aioli, and sweet pepper slaw; and Grilled Coulotte Steak, fried yucca, ti malice, and avocado puree.

Photo courtesy of Cane & Table.

As for the cocktails, Estopinal said that he wanted to offer a combination of New Orleans classics and cocktails with a tropical edge. With the help of bar manager, Jamaican-born Omar Jacks, Cane & Table’s cocktail menu honors the classic nose of beloved New Orleans cocktails with a Caribbean feel while keeping the offerings more modern.

“The Hurricane [& Table] is a cocktail that I feel really good about that honors the city,” he said. “We have a great team of bartenders who come up with drinks and we keep it fresh with three or four menu changes a year. One hundred years ago cocktails were cared for and lovingly crafted but the economy has eroded that. I’m interested in reviving that practice, which is what we did with Cure. We want to offer New Orleans classics that maybe don’t go back 100 years but might go back to the ’50s and ’60s.”

Estopinal notes that with Jacks’ influence, Cane & Table’s cocktail program has blossomed with the bartender’s unique use of herbs, fruit and botanicals.

Cocktail selections include What’s The Dill, an herbaceous combination of Swedish Aquavit, fresh dill, orange shrub, and finished off with celery bitters; Vieja Mayaa, a take on the Old Cuban with Mexican rum, fresh mint, citrus, and sparkling wine; Devil In Disguise, an approachable, aromatic Manhattan with Jamaican rum and amaro; and Reserve Mai Tai made with Long Pond 14 year Jamaica rum, Rivers Grenada rum, Rhum J.M. VSOP, curacao, orgeat, lime, and mint.

In honor of Cane & Table’s 10th anniversary, the restaurant plans a dinner series with wine pairings over the next few months.

Cane & Table 1113 Decatur Street, 504-581-1112. Open Monday through Friday, 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Closed on Tuesday.