NOLA 2012: Beignets and Brass

Fats, Al, and moi

After being chauffeured all over the city on Monday and eating as much as we did, on Tuesday Sweetie and I decided we'd better do some walking. It wasn't a particularly eventful day. We mostly wandered around the French Quarter. Sweetie took a lot of pictures of cute houses. The photographic evidence also shows that we ate lunch at Remoulade, which is "the casual side of Arnaud's." It was quite inexpensive, and the food was good.

We also walked to the riverfront as the afternoon turned blustery. We hit several of the shops in the French Market, where we found a great baby gift for a friend who is about to have her first child and some inexpensive but nice hand-crafted jewellery. It's hard to avoid "made in China" stuff in New Orleans, but there are locally made goods if you look hard enough.

I spotted the studio of WWOZ. This is a totally cool radio station that plays all kinds of New Orleans music. It's the station where the Davis McAlary character on the TV series Treme supposedly works (when he works).

We also made the requisite stop at Café du Monde. Can't go to New Orleans without going to Café du Monde! We got coffee and beignets, of course. Since they're open 24 hours a day, it's most fun showing up there in the wee hours of the morning. But we no longer keep those kinds of hours, so we were part of the crowd at the opposite end of the day.

For dinner, we returned to the Marigny Brasserie. Really, the catfish we had on Sunday was so good that we figured the place deserved another visit. As well, it was conveniently between our B&B and Frenchmen Street. We didn't want a lot of food, so we went for their daily special, which was crawfish po-boys, along with a side of corn fritters. I probably spent more on beer than on food! The "dessert" stout was very tasty.

Tremé Brass Band with guests

We then returned to d.b.a., this time to hear the Tremé Brass Band. This is a traditional New Orleans brass band, and they play really well. The guy who plays the bass drum is in his 80s and apparently lives in a nursing home near Frenchmen Street. They also have a somewhat younger guy on snare, who is the band leader, as well as younger players on sousaphone, alto saxophone, trombone, and trumpet. We didn't dance like on Sunday, but we were bopping along. At one point, they were joined by another trombone player and a white guy on trumpet. Sometimes, the trumpet player sang, as on a Sachmo-like version of "Cabaret." Sometimes, the old guy on the bass drum sang! New Orleans is full of excellent musicians.

Having been out all day, we were glad their set started at 9. We did not make a late night of it!