House of Blues food hits right notes

The menu reads as if someone accidentally plugged in the latitude for New Orleans and the longitude for Boston, then navigated to some "Lost"-ian in-between land; the stress of the situation then made them crave comfort food. You'll find catfish, po' boys, and jambalaya. You'll find Boston baked beans, clam chowder, and Maine lobster rolls. And you'll find burgers, pizza, and steak. Rather than a hodgepodge, it comes across as a regional salute. Many of these dishes are found on House of Blues menus nationwide, but not the likes of the New England seafood bake; it's as if the food of Louisiana pulled Yankee fare onstage to play a few songs, a gesture of friendship and respect. Executive chef Tindaro LoSurdo is from around here, so these are his culinary traditions, too.

Creole and Cajun dishes don't offer the to-die-for deliciousness of the versions you'll find in situ, and that could probably go without saying. But the knockoffs evoke the originals pleasantly; just because you're not on the trip doesn't mean you're not glad to get the postcard. "Voodoo shrimp" won't conjure any spirits, but the appetizer is more interesting than standard bar food. The shrimp are pan-seared and served with chunks of corn bread in a buttery, herb-tinged sauce made with Sam Adams. The sauce is on the sweet side.

Also more interesting are catfish nuggets, crispy, golden bites of fish. Work your way through the pile and you discover a little cache of sweet potato fries hiding beneath. The "spicy" tartar sauce alongside could be spicier.

Gumbo here is underwhelming (particularly if a home-cooked version you ate at a friend's Mardi Gras gathering still lingers in your mind, as it does mine). Our cup is served only a little bit above room temperature, which doesn't help; chunks of chicken and shrimp are overcooked. Still, there's a nice flavor to it from file, or powdered sassafras.

Jambalaya is better, served again with shrimp and chicken, with a good, smoky flavor from andouille. It's savory but could use more heat. Cajun meatloaf tastes more like soup mix than Cajun spices, but it's a filling serving with mushroom gravy and buttery mashed potatoes. On a recent night, the unspecified "vegetables" that come with many of the dishes are universally broccoli. It's bright green and still has a bit of crunch, a welcome bit of nutrition thrown into the mix of burgers and pizza.

Those burgers aren't bad. One version comes with smoked gouda, bacon, and Jim Beam barbecue sauce. The sweetness and smokiness make an appealing combination. A similar combination on a pizza with barbecued chicken doesn't work as well; there's too much sauce, and it makes the pie too sweet. A fried haddock sandwich is basic but fine, though it dissolves into a mess when you bite into the flaky fish.

New England specialties come served in a little tin pail, seemingly to evoke the feeling of a seafood shack, albeit one decorated with outsider art. Two petite lobster rolls served in one of these buckets are not the real deal of toasted hot dog buns brimming with large chunks of tail and claw kissed by mayonnaise, nor are they an atrocity. The buns are too fancy, the lobster pieces too small, but they rate a solid "decent." (The question is: Who orders lobster rolls at the House of Blues?) The Boston baked beans available as a side are quite tasty, smoky, sweet, and tender.

But what the restaurant does best is big hunks of meat. A full rack of baby back ribs is coated in piquant, sticky, sweet-hot sauce, an obscenely large portion good for sharing. They come with mashed sweet potatoes flavored with too much cinnamon, and more broccoli.

The biggest surprise here is the steak. One diner, a veteran of too many steaks requested medium-rare but delivered well-done, asks for the meat in his flat-iron salad to be cooked rare. And that's how it comes - blue, in fact, seared on the outside and bright red on the inside. The salad is worth ordering, with your steak requested the way you'd actually like to eat it: It's tossed with black beans, corn, plenty of avocado, romaine, and creamy dressing.

Grilled filet mignon, requested medium-rare, is cooked perfectly. It comes with crawfish bordelaise that seems incidental; people push away the bits of buglike seafood on top to get at the meat, served with more buttery mashed potatoes and broccoli. LoSurdo, it turns out, used to be a chef at Smith & Wollensky. He's a secret steak weapon in the kitchen.

Desserts are giant, gooey, or both. Chocolate mousse cheesecake is a slice the size of your head. Ignore the word "cheesecake"; this is really more of a mousse, with a chocolate cookie crust and raspberry sauce. There's also Boston cream pie, Key lime pie, and banana bread pudding, all acceptable if nothing to write home about.

To drink, you'll find an unexciting but adequate selection of beer, plus a full bar and a selection of wines from the likes of Clos du Bois and Newman's Own. There's no cocktail list, but our waitress tells us to order whatever we want and the bartenders will figure out how to make it.

The staff members here all seem just that game - they like to recommend their favorite dishes, don't mind repeating the list of beers ad nauseam, and are casually attentive. It's possible that tattoos are a requirement for employment, but more likely they correlate with an ability to work a full shift in a room full of recorded rock 'n' roll din. Expect to shout if you sit near a speaker.

House of Blues got its start in Cambridge; the opening of the new venue in Boston brings things full circle. Eating at the restaurant, though, you barely even know you're next to a club. It's only when you head downstairs to the bathrooms that you see people lined up to hear the band. The House of Blues' Gospel Brunch starts up Sunday and there will soon be live music on weekends, so the food and music may feel a bit more integrated.

There is something of the theme park to House of Blues. The live music, folk art, and regional fare are all part of a corporate formula that still manages to feel reasonably spontaneous, mainly because art, music, and cooking are spontaneous forms of expression. If there's a slight aftertaste of the ersatz to the food, well, we're situated alongside Fenway, which is a bit of a theme park itself. And lord knows we love it.

Devra First can be reached at dfirst@globe.com.