The vintage Coca-Cola sign over 3306 Esplanade Avenue still reads "Terranova's Supermarket." The business under it is Dué Market, which is new and separate, and the people working inside often send customers next door. According to NOLA.com, the old sign has caused some confusion about what is new, what is back and what has changed. Both owners spend part of their day pointing people to the right counter.
That small daily routine sums up how food shopping changed around Bayou St. John over the past year and a half. A 1925 grocery became two shops, and a bayou-side auto garage became a farm stand. The businesses that moved into those buildings now send customers back and forth.
One grocery, two counters
Terranova Supermarket opened on Esplanade in 1925. Benjamin and Lena Terranova founded it, and it passed down through the family until Benjamin and Karen ran the final grocery version. The store closed on May 31, 2025, the year it turned 100. Benjamin and Karen were ready to retire, and NOLA.com reported that small groceries had gotten harder to run as distribution channels favored larger operators.
The family didn't sell the whole operation or close it. The fourth generation, Anthony and Jennifer Terranova, divided the old grocery into smaller spaces and kept the part they could run themselves. Terranova's Meats opened on Tuesday, August 26, 2025, at 3308 Esplanade. Jennifer Terranova called it "a rebirth" in NOLA.com's coverage of the reopening. Benjamin and Karen still help run the shop on a lighter schedule.
The rest of the room went to Cecile and Barre Tanguis, who live a few blocks away. They opened Dué Market there this summer. Dué is Italian for "two," as in the second chapter of the building. The shop has a sandwich counter, gelato, sno-balls, coffee and a small shelf of gourmet groceries. Where Y'at described the sandwiches: mini mortadella and stracciatella "paninetto" on Dong Phuong brioche, a classic hero, and spicy tuna on Spanish pan de cristal. Gelato comes from Gelato Go, and pastries come from Bittersweet Confections.
Why two businesses outsell one
The two shops divide the work by agreement. Dué makes a hero on a Dong Phuong roll and hot braised Italian beef pressed on flatbread. It does not make a muffuletta, because the Terranova family asked it not to.
The muffuletta has a history. Benjamin's father, the late Anthony Terranova Sr., perfected his own version around 2002. After he died, the family kept making it in his honor. Karen Terranova told NOLA.com:
"We said he'd come back to haunt us if we didn't."
When the full grocery was open, the family had time to make muffulettas only on Saturdays, and they often sold out early. Now that customers who found Dué are also finding the butcher shop, the Terranovas make them most days. A smaller shop with a busy neighbor ended up making its signature sandwich more often than the 100-year-old full-service store ever did. NOLA.com reported that the extra attention has helped both businesses.
The garage where the bayou meets the Greenway
A few blocks away, the same idea played out in a building that never sold food. For years, the triangular lot at Hagan Avenue and Moss Street was R&S Auto Service. After the R&S family retired, Caroline Rogers and Mike Bertel bought the property. In mid-June they opened Farmer's at 519 Hagan Ave. The glass garage doors are still there. They now look out on the corner where Bayou St. John meets the Lafitte Greenway.
Farmer's is a "farm stop," a format that works like a farmers market open every day. The economics are what make it different. According to NOLA.com's opening report, producers set their own prices and keep 70% of each sale. The store keeps 30% and handles the selling and marketing. "It allows farmers to make more money than in traditional wholesale," Rogers told the paper. Bertel called it "a straight transparent transaction."
The owners raise Wagyu beef and heritage pork at their own farm, Three Fires Farm in Poplarville, Mississippi, about an hour's drive away. Bertel described the problem the store was meant to solve: "People want to buy local meat, but most people can't buy a quarter, a half and whole (animal)." Leighann Smith runs the butcher counter. She used to run the butcher program at Cochon Butcher, and she later owned Piece of Meat, which was around the corner on Bienville Street until it closed in 2023. Her chicken liver pâté is back on the counter.
The Farmer's producer page lists a regional pantry:
- Meat and seafood: Three Fires Farms, Pearl River Pastures, Best Stop, Mr. Shrimp
- Dairy and eggs: Sinagra Dairy, Bayou Sarah Farms, Mauthe's Progress Milk Barn
- Bread: Bellegarde Bakery, Leo's Bread, Flour Moon Bagels
- Produce and more: Two Dog Farms, Faust Farms, Baby T-Rex Farms, Wild Bush Wines from the Northshore, Mammoth Coffee Co., Tiny Nest Botanicals
At opening, the owners also announced plans for a small garden center run by Tiny Nest Botanicals and an Airstream coffee bar called Shiny Thing, using Mammoth beans.
Thursday turns the stops into a route
The connections reach past Farmer's own doors. The Crescent City Farmers Market sets up every Thursday afternoon at Lafitte Greenway Plaza, 500 N. Norman C. Francis Parkway, starting at 3 p.m. That is steps from Farmer's. Bertel told NOLA.com that being so close helps farmers coordinate their deliveries and lets shoppers make a bigger run in one trip, and he expects more collaboration with the market.
Put these together with the Esplanade shops and Canseco's, the full-service neighborhood grocery at 3135 Esplanade, and you have one loop. The bayou is the spine.
| Stop | Address | Go for | Hours as posted |
|---|---|---|---|
| Terranova's Meats | 3308 Esplanade Ave. | Specialty meats, cold cuts, muffulettas | 9 a.m.–6 p.m. Tue.–Fri., 9 a.m.–3 p.m. Sat. |
| Dué Market | 3306 Esplanade Ave. | Italian sandwiches, gelato, sno-balls, imported pantry | 8 a.m.–9 p.m. daily, per its website |
| Canseco's Esplanade Market | 3135 Esplanade Ave. | Full grocery | 7 a.m.–10 p.m. daily |
| Farmer's | 519 Hagan Ave. | Local produce, dairy, butcher counter, wine | 10 a.m.–7 p.m. Mon.–Sat., 11 a.m.–6 p.m. Sun. at opening |
| Crescent City Farmers Market | 500 N. Norman C. Francis Pkwy. | Thursday farmers market | Thursdays from 3 p.m. |
Small shops change their hours often, so check before you make a special trip.
Bienville Street follows the same pattern
The restaurant changes nearby follow the same pattern of reusing old rooms. In February, the owners of Dahla, Glenn Mahiya and Warakorn "Tom" Intavichai, opened Chada, a Thai-fusion restaurant, in a long-vacant double shotgun at 3420 Bienville St. The Munch Factory moved from the Joseph M. Bartholomew golf course clubhouse into the former Frey Smoked Meats space at 4141 Bienville, and it serves dinner again. Bonnie and Chris Borges turned the longtime MoPho space at 514 City Park Ave. into Charmant, a bistro and wine bar. Bonafried, which started as a pop-up in 2014 and then became a food truck, opened its first permanent home early this year in the former Splish Splash Washateria at 3101 Grand Route St. John. The partners who relaunched Liuzza's took over the old Delta Blues Club and DMac's at 542 S. Norman C. Francis Pkwy. and reopened it as True South, a bar and music venue with Southern sandwiches.
Rooms open up here too. Smoke & Honey, the Greek and Jewish neighborhood spot at 3301 Bienville, closed after a final lamb party on September 26 and 27. Owner Vassiliki Ellwood Yiagazis told NOLA.com that building it had been "one of the greatest honors of my life." If the past two years are a guide, someone will give that space another chapter, the way Smith's butcher skills moved from Piece of Meat on Bienville to the counter at Farmer's.
November, a short walk past the bayou
The loop ends at the edge of City Park, and the park's November calendar is close enough to fit into a shopping trip:
- November 7: A Pelican Greenhouse plant sale with native plants, annuals, perennials, vegetables and herbs.
- November 7–9: The free Allstate Sugar Bowl Tennis Classic, with finals at City Park Tennis Center on November 9.
- November 13–14: The first Fit Fête weekend, with community games, a wellness festival and the return of the New Orleans Marathon, according to FOX 8.
- November 27: Celebration in the Oaks opens and runs through January 1, 2027.
A Saturday morning at the plant sale passes the Terranova counter on Esplanade, and Saturday is the one day the butcher shop closes at 3 p.m.
Jennifer Rice and Lauren Mendheim represent homes in New Orleans whose histories matter as much as their square footage. If you own a home near the bayou and want to understand what its story is worth today, request a complimentary home valuation.
