The dining room at R’evolution.

R’evolution, which opened last summer in the Royal Sonesta Hotel, might seem like a mirage as you enter the serene, stately dark wood bar area just paces from the rowdy, gaudy party strip. But take a few sips of a ratafia-spiked cocktail and you’ll be grounded in a delightful reality. That ratafia, by the way, is brandy infused with wild fruit from the swampland. It’s made by chef John Folse, who can wax rhapsodic in his mellifluous, soft-edged Cajun drawl about the drink, which he makes in 20-gallon ceramic pots at one of his plantations in Baton Rouge. He’ll do the same about the butter, which is nothing short of silken, from the dairy farm on his other plantation 70 miles west.