New Orleans Travelogue, Continued

Cultural variants of fried dough are as prevalent as cultural variants of pancakes. In New Mexico alone, there are three variations: sopaipillas, Native American fry bread, and churros. The New Orleans twist on fried dough, is of course the beignet. Beignets are pockets of fried dough, powdered with sugar and served with cafe au lait. Therefore, no trip to New Orleans is complete without a visit to Cafe Du Monde for coffee and an order of beignets. The cafe au lait here is one part coffee mixed with one part milk.   

The coffee in the cafe au lait is mixed with chicory root. Chicory root adds body to the coffee. It is in the same family as raddicchio and endive.  

Below are some random tinted photos from my trip to New Orleans. 

Ceiling Fans at Cafe Du Monde

Break Area for Cafe Du Monde Staff

Live Oak Photographed From Inside Moving Car

New Orleans Travelogue, Day 1

I went to New Orleans for a few days to visit my family. My Mother's cousin, Winsome (Winnie) and her husband Neville (whom my Mom hadn't seen in almost 40 years), were visiting from Australia. Day One was a visit to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival with my Dad and Uncle Neville (second cousin?). 


In my salad days, the Jazz Fest was all about the music. Now its more about the food. The crowds were already thick with people lining up for traditional and non-traditional fare by mid-day. Someone standing beside us said, he brought a hundred dollars specifically to sample food here all day.

My Dad, Uncle Neville and I ate shrimp and sausage gumbo on a "table" that was an an old wooden spool painted the color of pistachio ice cream. Unfortunately, my music photos came out better than the food ones so no food photos this year. Alas, the limitations of a point and shoot camera!

The Jazz Fest is the last weekend in April and the first weekend in May. The music starts late morning and continues into the early evening on 10 stages, with another stage devoted mostly to interviews.


We headed over to the fais-do-do tent to hear some music and watch some dancing. We listened to the band Feufollet, who was nominated for Grammy award this year.

Fais-do-do

According to Wikipedia: A Fais do-do is a name for a Cajun dance party, originating before World War II. According to Mark Humphrey the parties were named for "the gentle command ('go to sleep') young mothers offered bawling infants."^[1]

After listening to more music, our hunger called again. You can't have lunch without dessert so we had mango freezes. It's mango sorbet that tastes as if the mango were just plucked from the tree.

The Jazz Fest is held at the New Orleans Fairgrounds, which doubles as a venue for horse racing. It's a big open field with limited protection from the sun and humidity. The canopy of a tree is a rarity. The humidity has its own persona and is palpable. It undulates around you in waves of moisture. People take protection from the sun into their own hands and create whimsical umbrellas and parasols. 

We exited the fairgrounds from a different place than we entered and walked through a mid-City New Orleans neighborhood. There was designated bicycle parking for the festival, it was a picturesque tableau with trumpet vines dangling over the wrought iron fence.

While waiting for my brother to pick us up, we stumbled upon a neighborhood park on the corner of Ponce de Leon and Esplanade. The green spot was an oasis from the unrelenting sun, we left at the Jazz Fest. Our musical journey continued. Two fountains greeted us and played soothing songs. Grasses and day lilies bordered the fountain. An almost hidden sculpture was an unexpected scare crow.

Jazz Fest

• New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival

Friday Fave Five (F3)

I think we all have our favorite blogging meme. Some of us participate in "Wordless Wednesday. For me it's the "Friday Fave Five" or F3. This week's F3 is devoted to coffee.

Back in the day -  before barista became a part of the urban lexicon, I worked at a coffee shop with three locations. On weekdays, it opened at 7:00 am. The patrons would line up outside for their morning fix in the humid dampness of pre-Katrina New Orleans. At 6:00 am, a pair of us would start brewing the coffee, a medium roast, a dark roast and decaf. Initially, we brewed the coffee in glass carafes, one carafe at a time. Then make freshly brewed iced tea. And turn on the Gaggia, the Italian cappuccino machine. Drinking coffee is a simple pleasure that anyone can enjoy and my five favorite coffee accoutrements are:


Friday Fave Five (F3)

1. Toddy Maker (aka cold-drip coffee maker)
2. Tassimo (almost instantaneous coffee for one without being instant coffee)
3. Aerolatte Milk Frother
4. Filtered Water
5. Bodum Santos stovetop coffee maker (my first coffee maker)

Cold drip coffee never touches hot water. Not using hot water eliminates the bitterness. (I learned that in coffee school!) I purchased my cold drip coffee (toddy) maker at a bodega down the street from where I lived in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was on clearance for $15. Before I got my toddy maker, I would make iced coffee in old one gallon glass pickle jars.  

Iced Coffee Recipe (Without Toddy Maker)

1 lb coffee, ground coarsely 
(finely ground coffee will not go through the filter)

2 tsp vanilla extract (or more to taste)

filtered water

Put coffee in one gallon jar or sun tea brewer. Fill jar to the top with filtered water and let it steep for at least 12 to 16 hours. After steeping, pour coffee through a mesh strainer lined with cheese cloth or a drip coffee filter into a carafe or pitcher. Add vanilla. The coffee is now a concentrate. Prior to serving, mix one part coffee with one part filtered water. If the coffee is too strong, add more water. Serve over ice with milk and sweeten to taste.   

Fun Facts

1. When in New Orleans, have café au lait and beignets at Café Du Monde.
2. When I was a barista my brothers called me Mrs. Olson of Folger’s coffee fame because I always smelled of coffee.
3. A great article on coffee from The New York Times.  
4. Kaldi, a goatherd, discovered coffee in Ethiopia in the 9^th century.
5. Jack Kerouac taught me how to make hobo coffee in On the Road. 

Photo Credits

Coffee Beans (courtesy of Mark Sweep, Wikipedia Commons)

Iced Coffee (Girl Sprout NM)