Fleurdelicious: French Quarter Festival 2010

The city of New Orleans and its faithful dwellers seem to always be looking for an excuse to have a party. Especially when those parties involve copious amounts of food, alcohol, and live music. From Mardi Gras season to Hurricane season and everything in between, this city has got it going on... all year long.

While I'm familiar with many of the parties and festivals this city holds annually, this past weekend was my very first time attending the French Quarter Festival, which has been boosting the city's spirits and revenue for over 20 years. The festival was held from Friday, April 9th to Sunday, April 11th, with food and music happening from 11 in the morning until about 9 o'clock at night. My boyfriend and I went with my parents on Sunday and spent five hours walking around the Quarter, eating from the local vendors, tapping our feet to Dixieland Jazz and Zydeco music, and we even slowed down long enough to relax, or in my dad's case, nap, under the shade of a Magnolia tree (with a bloody mary in hand, of course).

So what delectable goodness did I eat? Well, let me first say that choosing was rather easy, considering I had already printed and highlighted everything on Tom Fitzmorris' "Obsessive Eater's Guide to French Quarter Festival 2010" that had a high rating (like I said here, I am a huge dork). I didn't get around to trying everything that I wanted to, but I did manage to cross off a good number of things on the list.

We started the day by camping out in Jackson Square and the first thing I had to have was Jacques-Imo's Slow Roasted Duck Po Boy, which I had once before at the James Beard Benefit I went to in March. For the record, it was just as fantastic the second time around. Then we hit up Muriel's for the combo plate of the Louisiana Crawfish and Goat Cheese Crepe and the Shrimp and Eggplant Stuffing. The crawfish had great flavor in the creamy sauce poured over the crepe and the stuffing was a savory mixture of plump shrimp and soft eggplant... cornbread stuffing ain't got nothing on this stuff! Next we got the Oyster Bonne Femme over Bow Tie Pasta from Antoine's, which may have been my favorite thing we ate. Because the oysters are cooked in their own liquor, the sauce is like eating one big melted oyster topped with Romano and Swiss cheese. Fabulous! We started craving something sweet so we resorted to Desire Oyster Bar's Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce. Even my dad, who is a self-proclaimed bread pudding connoisseur, said that it was "very, very, good".

After listening to the Panorama Jazz band for a while, we decided to move to Woldenberg Park, where we camped out underneath a Magnolia tree. There I had Audubon Nature Institute's Crawfish Bread, which was more like a crawfish pie, boasting a hot and spicy crawfish filling inside a flaky dough. Then it was Emeril's Delmonico's Crawfish and Veal Sausage Po-Boy with Smothered Peppers, which I only had one bite of because I found it to be a little dry. My boyfriend got the Cajun Meat Pie from Mrs. Wheat's Pies, which I snagged two bites of because it was excellent. And to end the eating frenzy I got some of the Gumbo Shop's Chicken and Andouille Gumbo. I was happy it had okra in it, but unhappy that some of the rice grains were not cooked. All in all, once I added a dash of Tabasco sauce, the flavor was pretty darn good.

With the sun beaming down and the cool breeze blowing in from the river, my first French Quarter Festival experience was an incredibly enjoyable one. It was a perfect Sunday full of streetcar rides, live music, food, and most importantly, time spent with family. So until next year New Orleans, thanks for the free music and the long-lasting memories... I'm sure we'll be in touch.