New Orleans--food and culture

                              

Friday, March 1, 2026--New Orleans.   We have really done New Orleans.  We've been staying in an 1810 house, said to be the 30th oldest structure in New Orleans.  Fireplaces and brick floors and extremely good food.  Crab, oyster, shrimp, fish...good Creole style cooking from friends and hosts Jon and John.  We introduced them to our traveling companions with a wonderful time of wine and shrimp on their patio.

We did a final dinner with Jane and Peter and Marc and Sheila at Herbsaint--  a really lovely restaurant with exquisite food.   Ben and John enjoyed starters of mussels in a butter cream soup.  Ben followed with flounder, while John did a mix of two small plates:  green fried tomatoes with poached shrimp and local fried oysters with a killingly hot sauce.  All superb.  It was pouring with rain so we managed a taxi home. Half the price of Uber!

The following day we enjoyed time decompressing.  Ben found a local coffee shop, Only Coffee, where the barista artfully designs hearts in his cappuccino foam.  We had a lovely lunch at Galatoires.  We all began with potato puffs, then turtle soup.  Ben finished speckled salt water trout meunière amandine while John enjoyed drum, a fish that makes a drum sound when mating. also almandine.  Both very tasty.  

Last night we didn't even try to eat dinner.  Too full.

Today, our last day in NOLA, we started with a walk around the sculpture garden at the New Orleans Museum.  It's very good collection of impressionist and modern sculpture set among the trees, some festooned with Spanish moss, and surrounding a lake--with a walkway that is below the top level of the lake, just like New Orleans, which is mostly below sea level, protected by levies.  

We lunched at Johnny's Po' Boy restaurant on St Louis Street near Jackson Square.  Host John's first apartment was on this street and blogger  John visited there in 1972!  The oyster po' boy was juicy, and perfectly done.  We walked back partly along Bourbon Street;  it's quite tacky.  Jackson Square is still as interesting as ever with art pinned to the fence walls and music from performers in the air.  A performer friend of John's was making her music on a corner on the way home. She had been nominated for a grammy.  New Orleans has musicians everywhere. 

A couple of groups of players got on the streetcar we rode from the museum gardens to downtown--a newly-built antique looking tram.  Befoe dinner, we went to the Maison Club on Frenchman Street to listen to a fine group that's one of host John's favorites.  Beautifully done.  

Now we will enjoy crab for dinner and off home tomorrow.