Adam Waxman is an award winning travel journalist focusing on…
New Orleans is renowned for Music, Cocktails and Cuisine. Check out what’s going on in this gem of a town, one of the most exciting destinations in the world.
New Orleans, the city that gave birth to jazz and the first US city to build an opera house now has more options for live entertainment than ever before. New Orleans has entire streets and neighborhoods dedicated to nightlife and live entertainment. The most famous of which is Bourbon Street and the French Quarter. But beyond Bourbon Street lies Frenchmen Street in the Faubourg Marigny – home to more than a dozen outstanding live music venues, restaurants and bars. Beyond Frenchmen, lies the St. Claude corridor which is adding new live performance bars and restaurants almost monthly. And the same old familiar live music halls are still hosting amazing shows nightly, including – Tipitina’s, Preservation Hall, Snug Harbor, The Howlin’ Wolf, The Maple Leaf, d.b.a. and The Spotted Cat, to name but a few.
New Orleans has never had a shortage of places to find a drink. It is home to countless various bars, lounges, taverns, saloons and beer gardens. But the city has seen a proliferation of cocktail and drink options since Katrina unlike anything before. Now, it seems that almost every neighborhood has a new watering hole serving everything from craft cocktails to draft microbrews. Further, New Orleans’ original Tales of the Cocktail event has grown from a small gathering of cocktail lovers into the world’s premier cocktail festival held each July. The festival has become the annual meeting place for bartenders, distillers and other spirit professionals to exchange new ideas, products and techniques. Last year, Tales of the cocktail hosted 18,000 visitors, generating an economic impact of $12.8 million.
All the old-guard, bastions of fine-dining that made New Orleans a food destination are still here and as good as you remember them being – Antoine’s (175 years old this year), Arnaud’s, Galatoire’s, Broussard’s, Commander’s Palace, Brennan’s , Palace Café, Pascal’s Manale…to name a few. Our chefs continue to collect James Beard Awards each year, and now, we have 600 more restaurants than we had in 2005. Our chefs and restaurant scene are evolving to extend beyond traditional genres that most are accustomed to associating with NOLA cuisine. Our new chefs and restaurants are serving award winning dishes in Vietnamese, Philippine, Chinese, Italian, Spanish, Mexican, Russian and Israeli cuisines as well.
Adam Waxman is an award winning travel journalist focusing on food, wine and well being. As well as an actor in film, television and formerly, the Stratford Festival, he is the Publisher of DINE and Destinations magazine.