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So it has come to our last full day in the New Orleans. The ole lady and I woke up with breakfast on our minds and no one else in the group seemed to even want to go eat. So we got dress and decided that Petunia’s was on our agenda for breakfast. Yes, this was suppose to be one of those places that you go eat and tell everyone that you’ve eaten there. So we take a stroll on down to St. Peters and walking up to it, it looked all vacant. Hmmmm, as we walk up to the door there was a piece of paper taped to it and told us that Petunia’s was closed and that the chef has opened up another restaurant called the Ole Nawlin’s Cookery on Conti. (Side note– after doing some searching on the internet, Petunia’s permanently closed their doors on June 1, 2009. Wow, was so close. Will someone every try to reopen? What happened? I will try to find out more.) Well, we were ravenous at that point so we just well, lets just try it anyways. So as we are walking those few blocks down to it we get hit up by people trying to pull ya into their restaurant to eat. We simply ignored the guy and came in the Cookery. As we were seated we saw the guy from outside doing the pulling of customers. Well we were rightfully confused. It so happens that this place has three names it goes by, Oceana Grill, Petunia’s and the Ole Nawlin’s Cookery. So the menu was set down in front of us and boom there ya have it, Petunia’s was the name on the menu. Was this Petunia’s menu? I don’t know, but after talking with some people, no it wasn’t. But it had some good ole cajun breakfast items to choose from. The ole lady tried to tell me she was getting the country breakfast and I promptly told her that wasn’t on the menu and no need into coming to New Orleans and ordering something we can make at home. She tells me she was kidding, but I do not believe that! But anyways the first thing that caught my eye was this omelet with alligator and andoullie sausage, but then there was the kicker. Topped with a crawfish and mushroom sauce. Stupid shellfish allergy. Well, my second choice was the Cajun Omelet that has tasso and ham. Yessir it was mouth watering good. See for yourself in the pics!

Well, the omelets were so big, we didn’t finish them and plus we had gotten text messages about them wanting some food, so we didn’t finish the omelets, and so we took them back to the room, after a few stops of course. Ha! So on the way to back to the room, we came across a store that we wanted to check out. It was the New Orleans School of Cooking and General Store. Come to find out, they do a cooking demo and then you get to eat it! Woah! I wish I new about this before hand, I woulda came here for lunch! But hind sight, ya know and we were leaving the next day so we couldn’t handle doing that then hitting the road. So it is on the list for the next trip. So then we venture back to the room and give the peeps the omelets. I dunno if they liked them or not, but ya know what, they were just good and we enjoy them.

So we all rested a bit and then decided to go hit up the Creole Tomato festival again. I got in touch with my friend that lived there and she was gonna walk from her place to the festival and our room was on her way so we met up with her. So we roamed on down to the French Market, taking a detour down Royal to take in some more sites. Well, we were about hungry again because it was around lunch time. So I hit up a booth that had alligator sausage on a stick. The ole lady tried a shrimp remoulade stuffed tomato. Mmm. That sounded so good, I wanted someone to try it so they could tell me how it was. Curse the shellfish allergy! Then there were other parts of the festival we didn’t see from Saturday. We were so thirsty we needed something to drink, so I stopped at one of these homemade lemonade stands. It was refreshing and hit the spot. Good stuff! Then we came across a cooking demo and the people doing it weren’t keeping my attention away from being so HOT. So I got up and checked out the other booths. Fresh creole tomatoes galore! Then I came across a basil and tomato crepe! And ya know what it was the longest line, but it was well worth it and I got to see how they made them and yes, I’ll recreate them soon.

So part of the group wanted to hit up the Crescent City Brewhouse, but I wasn’t done trying some of the local foods. So we went towards the back of the festival and then hit up GW Fins to try their bananas foster. Yes, bananas foster, created by the chef at Brennen’s (the original) restaurant. It was my first stab at a bananas foster and I must say it was mighty tasty that I am sitting here thinking that I want some more. Well, my local friend needed to get going, she was wanting to see a play called Shotgun, which it was about race relations and hurricane Katrina. I do believe that is what she told me. Well, we met up with the rest of the traveling crew at the Crescent City Brewhouse. We walked up to the bar with everyone else and I was talked into trying their beer sampler. Quick evaluation. The pilsner is pretty much like any domestic beer. The red stallion was really hoppy, but was a good amber beer. The black forrest was ok. I’m not much of a dark beer drinker. It was very malty. The Weiss beer is their wheat beer. I have been found of a wheat beer. So I must say it was my favorite as it had a smooth and sweet finish. I can’t really remember the special. It wasn’t my favorite so I’ll just say, go try it. Well, we head on back to the room to scoop up my dad who was studying since he has gone back to school. We all agree on a place to eat for dinner and also we decide to ride the street car down to the end of the French Market as this is where the restaurant was. Coops Place was a small little restaurant/bar. Only had a couple people in there working and to say we scooped up the last table which made us think this was a good place. My friend recommended it, so I took her word for it. After studying the menu as much as I could, I went with the Rabbit and Sausage Jambalaya. Oooh this was a mighty tasty dish. So tasty that the ole lady googled to find the recipe. Yessir! Will try to recreate as best as I can, but with probably a chicken as I don’t think I can pick up rabbit at my local grocer.

Well we met up with a friend of a person of the group, she came to dinner with us at Coop’s and then took us to a bar that locals go to. Well, if you were a tourist and came across this bar, you would probably not go in there AND its right off of Bourbon St. Well, next time I’m in the NOLA area I’ll be going to Johnny White’s as it was just a quaint little bar for the chillin experience. It was wasn’t over the top expensive or anything, very reasonable. We all really enjoyed ourselves there. So it will be a destination once again.

This is the end of the trip. We came in around 1 AM, caught some shut eye and then woke up to start our adventure back home. We were back in the StarkVegas around 3:30. So it was a very enjoyable trip and I had fun. I would like to go back soon, because my list of things to do in New Orleans just got bigger.

So we wake up all cramped in our presidential suite Saturday. Lets just say some people are not morning people, myself included, but I have gotten better. So we start venturing into the quarter and if you’ve ever been to New Orleans you’ll know their marketing ploys. Have people outside trying to drag you into their establishments. Well, we weren’t even in the quarter and we got pulled into this lil whole in the wall joint to have breakfast. Dixie’s Gyros had two ladies in there whipping up a home cooked breakfast. Which was a cozy little hole in the wall and it wasn’t too shabby. We did save a few bucks going to that joint.

So now that we are all full, I want to head on over to the French Market. Hearing nothing but good things about it, I wanted to check out all of the fresh produce and what not that would be available to buy. Well we didn’t get till around 10, so I was wondering if there would still be produce to buy. Well, with many, many stops on the way to the market I finally arrived! Well only the first booth was fresh produce, the rest of the market was more of a flea market than anything. LOTS AND LOTS of STUFF! Yeah, there wasn’t any junk that I saw was really worth anything for myself, except for this book, which with my trusty iPhone, I took a picture of and check it out on SnapTell and found it on Amazon for $25.55 instead of the $35 they were charging at the booth.

So now I wanted the Creole Tomato Festival to get started. Hear some good music, eat some good food and all that. So about the time we were getting hotter than everything and ready to go scoop up some lunch, the festival was starting to take shape. A little jazz band was marching through the market and into the festival area. Here is a little video I uploaded to YouTube:

Well, with everyone in our group is hotter than three levels of hell, its time to venture off to scoop up some muffaletta! Yes I was mega excited about this. Muffaletta from Central Grocery. It was an experience I must say. They had all of these import foods to buy and what not. Could probably spend some major bank in there and they had some cool foods in there. But with the line going out of the door, there is no time for shopping, cause everyone was hungry. Well, lemme tell you about the experience. Have you ever seen the “Soup Nazi” episode of Seinfeld? Yessir! It reminded me of that, and he got especially grumpy when we bought some olive salad on the side. Knowing they were busy, but 15 seconds ain’t gonna hurt him for us to grab that. As we were walking out of the door a delivery guy from Leidenheimer’s was bringing in sackfuls of Muffaletta buns. Yes Leidenheimer’s is a local bread in New Orleans and it was mighty tasty. Too bad I left the leftover muffalettas in the cooler. Hope mom and dad enjoyed them! Sigh!

Well after eating that lunch a nap soon hit us. We slept for a few hours, enough to to drag on back out into the quarter. I thought I was feeling this twelve dollar burger from Dickie Brennen’s Palace Cafe. Well come to find out, the dinner menu didn’t sound very appealing. So onto Bourbon because Dad hadn’t walked down there yet. So we come up on to Dickie Brenne’s Bourbon House and yes the menu sounded like we wanted to try it out. I was worried cause I saw white table clothes, but oh well, its my birthday and I wanted a good meal!

The fans were really cool, but I didn’t like the single point of failure. Being a techie person, yeah we tend to worry about points of failures, but it was might cool how the one motor and a really long belt ran the fans. So back onto the menu. There were two things that really peaked my interests, the Pork Porterhouse and the Pan Seared Tuna. So after the ole lady ordered and the waiter said to her, “Look you are at the #7 rated seafood house in the country. I would order seafood.” So she ordered the Redfish on the Halfshell, which was pretty tasty! Oh you probably wondering what I ended up with. Well after the waiter’s spill, I ended up with the Pan Seared Tuna. Which was might, mighty tasty. Was leery about ordering something that would still be cold in the middle, but it had great flavor and was just plain ole good.

Well, so dessert time came around, which surprisingly I still had room for it. After much debate I ended my meal with the Bourbon House Milk Punch. Yessir! It was lovely and the ole lady (I think she really likes it when i call her that. haha!) got herself a piece o chocolate cake with ganache. If you know her, she loves that ganache!

Now since we were in New Orleans, we couldn’t go there without kicking it at some jazz bar listening to some good music. I can’t recall the name of the bar, but I can recall the prices of the drinks! A bottled water was $6.75. UNREAL! I know you need to pay the musicians, but wow! $6.75! My draft beer was that price, and yes that was the cheapest drink(s) on the menu. But the music was good! That’s why we went to the place.

Well after taking in a few songs, we decided to just roam up and down Bourbon. Lets just say on a Saturday night you see some characters! The latex guys was a sight. But I didn’t get into anything too crazy. Oh yeah, we ended the night at Cafe Du Monde with some beignets and cafe au lait! Man that stuff is SLAMMIN! So back for another jaunt to the room for a night sleep, then one more day in the Big Easy.

Continued later.

Part 1 of …. I don’t know, I’m going to break this up in a couple blogs so its not a long boring read. So enjoy the series.

Well, this past weekend was my birthday and can say that I lived to see 30. After Friday’s roller coaster ride in the van it was not an understatement. So my parents and a couple of friends that my mom works with came and pick us up at my house getting ready to venture on down to the “Big Easy.” The driver turned out of my neighborhood opposite than what I thought would be the most efficient route to NOLA. So after I suggested that we go another way, yes, the driver completed a successful U-turn on Hwy 12 with oncoming traffic coming our way. As the van was straightened the traffic was right on our tail. Everyone’s face (other than the driver’s) was pale white after seeing that the van was about to get t-boned not even a mile away from my house. Well, we were safe for the time being. Then I suggested we take Oktoc road to Crawford onto Alt 45 to take us to Brooksville. Those of you from around here will know what I’m talking about. If you are to go south on Hwy 45, that is a much quicker way to get there. Well, sitting in the very back of the van you felt every single bump and curve to the max. No I’m not trying to complain, but oh my! Well we were successful in making it to Louisiana. Dropped off one of the passengers at a bar in Metairie for her to meet up with some friends. So another driver takes over and guess what happens again? Another U-turn into oncoming traffic! This time I didn’t think we were actually gonna make it. I could see it all happening. Two cars hit us, traffic piles up and it’s not a pretty sight. Well, luckily the two cars slowed down enough for us to make our turn and we were on our way to the resort. FINALLY we made it to the resort all safe and sound.

Now that the fast and furious car ride down to NOLA has concluded, its on to the many things we did while we were down there. Well, when we arrived to our room and checked in everyone was starving! So as we were trying to figure out what to eat, we decided for instant gratification at the Harrah’s casino. Yes, let me NOT recommend that place, over priced and you’d get a better meal at Barnhill’s. The tea suck, blah. I know we are in New Orleans, but no one would make a decision and people wanted to hit up the casino. So there ya go, two birds one stone, never do that again.

Well, as the ole lady and I did not want to stay at the casino, we opted to hit up Bourbon for the night. Met up with some friends that happened to be in town that night and chilled at Desire Oyster Bar and I drank a beer with them. They then decided to go see some seediness and again we opted not to go. Just stroll down Bourbon and take in all in. I remember going to New Orleans pre-Katrina and it was overly crowded the balconies were packed and so on. I know it is not quite the same, but they are trying. If you haven’t been, go. It still has that soul feeling. We then walked back to the room and then just chilled back in the presidential suite where we slept SIX. Yes, suite = bed coming out of the wall, a couch, an overly sized table, a 47″ LCD TV and a big bathroom. Yes probably only about 500 square feet to sleep six people. Well it was interesting anyways.

To be continued.