You Must Eat in NOLA Before You Can Cook NOLA

This past weekend I went down to New Orleans to celebrate with a big group of friends. Conveniently, this coming weekend I'm hosting the Confederacy of Dunces inspired Supper.  It was tough, but I found times to escape my own Confederacy of Dunces to take full advantage of trying out some dishes I'll be cooking, buying ingredients, and checking out a statue of our protagonist, Ignatius J. Reilly.

On Saturday morning, while nursing my Bourbon Street hangover, I strolled around the 90 degree streets with my camera and took New Orleans in.  I had to laugh at the "Lucky Dog" hot dog carts parked along many street corners around the French Quarter.  I couldn't help picturing Ignatius wolfing down his dogs, burping away and wreaking his havoc.  If that description doesn't make you want to read the book, I don't know what will.

Could This Be Ignatius' Cart??

Later in the day, I walked through the open air French Market, half of the stalls being very cheesy novelty gifts, the other half fooooood...I didn't eat anything, but I did buy myself some "Slap Ya Mama" creole spices that I plan on using for a couple of the dishes.  I opted to not buy the instant grits they were selling.  I'll test my luck to find some slow grits in NYC.  How else can you make them regular, creamy or al dente?

Next, I went into a gift shop on Decatur and couldn't believe my luck: there was a box of Mardi Gras King Cake mix for sale, that included the requisite plastic baby, and green, purple and gold sugar crystals.  This will make my life much easier, and probably make the cake a lot more authentic looking, since I don't exactly pride myself on baking.

On Monday, my last day in town, I head over to pay a visit to Ignatius' statue on Canal Street.  It did not do him justice on the size scale, but I just love that New Orleans loves him.

I met up with my friends who I had been nagging all weekend about trying a Muffaletta, and we head over to the birthplace of the Muffaletta, Central Grocery.  Guess what? They're closed on Mondays.  So we went to Johnny's Po Boys and guess what?  They ran out of Muffaletta ingredients.  Time was now of the essence, I couldn't miss my flight for a sandwich, no matter how rational that sounds.  So we raced over to Franks on Decatur.  It probably wouldn't have been my first choice, but we sat outside on their balcony, they put my order in ASAP, and I must say, I loved it!

Frank's Muffaletta

The olive salad was very good, with a great olive oil taste.  Salty meat, creamy cheese and tangy olive salad goes verrrrry well on semolina bread!  I can't wait to turn this sandwich into a hot dog on Saturday, and hopefully wow the crowd with my new-found knowledge of New Orleans fare.