Couvillion: Gonna have big veggies on the bayou

Next time I go to Couvillion, I’m going to build my meal around the cauliflower salad. BEST cauliflower I’ve ever had in my life.

And I don’t typically like capers or mustard, but when you get them together with the mild sweetness of cauliflower, somehow they work.

Couvillion is the newest restaurant in the Germantown cuisine cluster that is growing off Goss Street and Spratt, anchored by the Post, Eiderdown, and Four Pegs. It took the place of the Former Finn’s, a gorgeous art nouveau building near the lofts.

Officially, Couvillion serves Cajun food, and, yes, your friends can get crawfish, jambalaya, and corn bread.

But let’s get right down to the vegetables. There are lots of them. And, while some folks might get sticker shock from a nine dollar beet salad, know that the portions are huge and beautifully crafted.

You can definitely make an entree out of a starter vegetable or side vegetable.

The chef at Couvillion has a knack for combining rather bland ingredients with highly savory relishes to create really tasty stuff.

The horseradish potato salad, with multi-colored skin-on potatoes, will blow your mother-in-law’s disgusting confection of overcooked potatoes, mayonnaise and sugar out of the water.

And you didn’t lose all your nutrients to the trash because someone thinks potatoes have to be skinned.

I’ve been to Couvillion three times in the past two weeks, so I can recommend the beet salad, the arugula salad, the red beans and rice (a very affordable option and it has all your protein), and, OMG, the turnip cakes.

If my taste buds have not failed me, the turnip cakes are made primarily with eggs and the white bulb of the turnip. They are available as a side or an entree served with grits, okra, and tomatoes.

Vegans, I love y’all, but you’re going to have to call in advance and make sure they can hold the butter.

Couvillion also has a gorgeous outside dining area for those who need to get back in the sun after a long, dreary winter.

And let me not forget to praise the cocktails which are free of simple syrup, the bane of cocktail drinkers everywhere. There’s something called a corpse reviver which lives up to its name.