Tech meets farm-to-table at the new Hyatt Regency New Orleans

Artist's rendering of the new 8 Block Restaurant and Bar at the Hyatt Regency New Orleans. The Hyatt Regency New Orleans will re-open on October 19.

Six years and $275 million later, the Hyatt Regency New Orleans is set to reopen on October 19. The Hyatt is aiming to get a piece of the convention business too small to fit in the massive convention center, but they’re also looking to make a dent in the city’s fiercely competitive culinary scene. Here’s a look at some of the more innovative food services the hotel will be rolling out at the Grand Opening.

Pizza Consegna
In a curious bit of diversification, the Hyatt will be getting into the pizza delivery business with Pizza Consegna, a delivery-only operation offering a single product: a simple, 18-inch Neapolitan pie made with  Antico Molino Caputo flour (the uber-flour for pizza dough). The service is available to hotel guests and nearby addresses in the Central Business District, and pizzas will be delivered free via eco-friendly, zero-emissions electric bikes.

A different kind of bar app
The Vitascope Bar, named after the first permanent for-profit movie house in New Orleans (and the world), takes a 21st century look at a decades-old bar favorite: the jukebox. Along with the bar, Hyatt is launching an iPhone and Android app that patrons will be able to use to control the lighting, entertainment and music, as well as browse menus and participate in bar-wide polls.

The digital guest DJ concept is sure to lead to some competition as groups of bar-goers compete to get the latest Lady Ga-Ga over some classic rock, but the app promises to be an interesting look at how deeply a brick and mortar business can merge with new technologies. Original cocktails and appetizers like crawfish and pork sausage pigs in a blanket round out the actual bar parts of this bar.

Eat/buy local
A recent training event looked like a who’s who in New Orleans premium restaurant supply. Cheese from the St. James Cheese Company, oysters from P & J Oysters and produce from Hollygrove Market and Farm round out an impressive list of ingredients set for the menu at the hotel’s 8 Block Restaurant and Bar, named for the notorious eight blocks of upper Bourbon Street.

“We want to ensure that we’re using seasonality as an influence,” says 8 Block’s food and beverage director Alex Hall. “It’s classic American, with a little bit of New Orleans.”

These ingredients will also pop up on menus at the hotel’s other restaurants, including Borgne, a New Orleans seafood restaurant from chef John Besh and former Galatoire’s executive chef Brian Landry. The restaurant is set to open at the Hyatt in winter 2011/2012.

Drawing inspiration from local seafood and the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago, the chefs hope to highlight the cuisine of the thousands of Canary Island immigrants who made up an important part of 18th century coastal Louisiana.