Sarah--

The quote is from _Life on the Mississippi and refers not to New
ORleans food generally but to its "chief dish," the pompano:

"We had dinner on a ground-veranda over the water--the chief dish the
renowned fish called the pompano, delicious as the less criminal forms
of sin" (p. 445, Oxford MT edition).  And the publication date is 1883,
not 1884.

Best,

Larry Howe