This full-length interview graced the cover of the Spring Restaurant Guide edition of Where Y’at magazine in 2009, delving into the American dream and one family’s success in achieving it. By asking smart and well thought out questions about the Drago’s Restaurant family’s past, present, and future, I was able to encourage a natural flow of conversation and transfer onto paper the personalities and the heart of the people behind “New Orleans’ Best Single Bite.”

The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of

(Begin Excerpt …)

An understated entrance in busy Fat City belies the modern décor and spacious establishment hidden behind dated red brick walls; the serpentine line of people crowded out those doors and through the parking lot served as only one indication of the treasure housed in such a humble facade. It’s not immediately apparent that the many-storied gray building is connected, but once indoors, the entire atmosphere changes as the size of the beautifully renovated restaurant is revealed. It’s a sensory overload. Look at the lobster tanks! The professional oyster shuckers behind the bar! Get hypnotized by the huge flames leaping through the air, dancing in joyous abandon as they carry on doing what made Drago’s famous—charbroiling oysters.

I wasn’t given too much time, though, to absorb my surroundings. It was only a moment before I was approached by the matriarch of the Drago’s empire—a woman of grandmotherly solidness you’d hug if she weren’t so meticulously dressed and well-accessorized; a lovely oyster with a perfect pearl hung around her neck.

“I’m Klara. Do you want coffee, or maybe lunch? Some charbroiled oysters?” she asked in a lovely lilting accent. “Tommy will be here soon.”

Tommy, the son who now runs the operations founded by his parents, Drago and Klara Cvitanovich, did indeed arrive soon. A tall man of powerful build, Tommy strode in authoritatively and self-assuredly, instantly recognizable by a charismatic and attention-grabbing aura. This was a man who was sure of himself. Drago himself followed, a bit more reservedly and with a cautious step. He greeted me with old world courtesy in a soft voice as kindly as his smile.

The Cvitanoviches, an immigrant family with roots in Croatia and ties in British Columbia, then sat down to tell me their story—the one of the American dream.

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That was just the introduction. Download and read the whole interview!