New Orleans and cocktails, two things nearest and dearest to my heart. Each year Tales of the Cocktail presents all the best of these two things; cocktails, cocktail history, New Orleans’ cocktail history, and, for the finale, your chance to participate in New Orleans cocktail history in the making. I’ll have more details for...
Last year was my first encounter with Krewe du Vieux. It’s definitely “one for the locals;” highly satirical and raunchy to the extreme, it’s also held early enough each year that it’s off of the regular Mardi Gras beer-and-hand grenade-swilling, boob-flashing tourist crowd’s radar. As KdV’s website says: It is unique among all Mardi...
“On my honor I will do my best: To do my duty to God and my country…” Oath, Boy Scouts of America. “I vow to personally buy the first Sazerac for any visitor who asks ‘Hey, where do I get a Hurricane?’ and pledge to pull out the Herbsaint and Rye no matter the...
I interviewed an artist up in Covington for my day job. He asked if I had seen any of Prospect.1, the international art exposition going on all over New Orleans. There are installations and showings of 80 artists from all over the world. The U.S. Mint and the Contemporary Arts Center are the main...
Halloween 2008. It’s been planned for at least a month now. Flash mob, Jackson Square, New Orleans. Pirates vs. Ninjas. Pirates gathered in Pirates Alley (duh), Ninjas in Pere Antoine Alley. At 5pm sharp, an air horn sounded, both sides met at battle in front of St. Louis Cathedral. Now, I have no doubt...
We went to catch up on streetcar photos for StreetCarArt.com today. They placed another set last week; Nola caught the ones in Lakeview last week and today we went to get the ones installed on Chartres, Jackson Square and at Cafe du Monde. They’ll be posted at the streetcar site soon. I collided with...
This isn’t a destruction photo. It’s from St. Louis No. 1 cemetery on Basin Street. Our family has a tomb there. The archdiocese opened the cemetery on Nov. 1, All Saints Day, in 2005. It was the first time since the storm it had been open to the public and would not be open...
More from Tales of the Cocktail, day 2 for me, day 3 for everyone else. After attending the absinthe seminar, we headed back downstairs to formulate a plan. A plan never actually materialized, in no small part because we chose the hall outside one of the tasting rooms to check the schedule. Inexorably drawing...
YLC Streetcar artists Paulette Lizano and Will Smith popped up during Tales of the Cocktail at the event’s Cocktail Marketplace on Saturday. Paulette, who is in the process of building her streetcar, “Perley’s Barnyard Party” was there selling glass coasters and plates featuring martini glasses and S&WB meter cover designs. Will Smith’s streetcar is...
I’ve decided to break this Tales of the Cocktail post into a few non-linear small parts. This part covers the first and last happenings of the day, the absinthe seminar and end-of-day cocktails at the Carousel Bar (below). I continued on my quest at Tales of the Cocktail to learn all there is to...
With that challenge, Kevin Brauch (the reporter on Iron Chef America who is not Alton Brown, thank Gawd) opened up Tales of the Cocktail. But first things first. Today’s kick-off event was Toast to Tales of the Cocktail in the Riverview Room of the Hotel Montleone. NOLA blogger Loki of Humid City and the...
I believe we have a winner of a new tradition in the works. It’s called San Fermin in Nueva Orleans, or more appropriately, the Running of the Bulls in New Orleans. See other coverage here and here. Held this morning in the Quarter, the New Orleans event pays tribute to the famous Running of...
Yesterday’s coffee klatch evolved into the ultimate tweet-up: lunch with Nola, Yat Pundit and Ryan (joined by his lovely fiance) at Galatoire’s Restaurant. Galatoire’s is on Bourbon Street, near the corner at Iberville. Besides fantastic Creole cuisine, it’s famous for quite a few quirks, among them that they don’t take reservations for the first-floor...
O.K. folks, I have received a request (or was it a challenge?) from Yat Pundit to post my quick and dirty version of a classic New Orleans dish, Chicken Bonne Femme (Good Woman’s Chicken?). Tujague’s has probably the best known version of the dish which is prepared with garlic, potatoes, white wine and, of...
During the French Quarter Fest I took a side trip into the St. Louis Cathedral. It’s a ubiquitous symbol that anchors the scene most associated with the city: what I call the “money shot” of Jackson Square taken from the Washington Artillery monument. I’m not going into a full history of the cathedral at...
Of all the festivals available to the south Louisianan, the French Quarter Fest has become by far my favorite one. It’s held in and celebrates my favorite place on earth, the French Quarter, where my family has connections stretching back to my great-great-great-great grandfather’s arrival here as a refugee in 1809. A French colonial...
Well, folks, we’re coming up on my one-year anniversary on the blogosphere, (blogoversary?). My first post, originally a guest post on Nolanotes, was a review of the French Quarter Fest. In light of my blogoversary and the the kickoff of FQF this weekend, I present for you, once again, my first blog posts (originally...
In coming weeks, one or more of you may find yourselves in receipt of a Major Award. No, not that one. This one: Pete & Nola’s Lucky Blog Award, recipients to be determined by as yet undetermined criteria. Now, I’m not big on blog bling at all. But I am one for a pun,...
It’s a wonder what you can see walking in a few short blocks. I arrived in the Quarter last night to meet relatives for dinner. I took a couple of loops around to find a parking space, but finally spotted one on Bourbon at Gov. Nicholls. Arriving about an hour early, I was on...
As I announced earlier, Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations show was airing its New Orleans episode this week. I wondered whether it would delve a little deeper than the episode he did in the city with his old show on the Food Network. I’d like to say it didn’t disappoint, but I can’t. It was...