New Orleans
New Orleans schöpft seine Faszination aus seiner Geschichte und der Vielfalt unterschiedlichster Kulturen. TALITHA LINEHAN erzählt von ihrer Entdeckungsreise im French Quarter und probiert sich durch die Köstlichkeiten der traditionellen Küche.
We explore the city’s French Quarter and discover a rich culinary tradition in a magical melting pot of cultures
Awonderful mixture of smells drifts through the morning air as I wander the cobbled streets of the French Quarter in New Orleans, nicknamed the “Big Easy.” I stop to read some of the menus on display, listing dishes with foreign-sounding names: étouffée, jambalaya, muffuletta…
Local food can be confusing for newcomers to Louisiana, but I’ve been here often enough to have acquired a basic understanding of the local lingo – and to know where to get the best breakfast in town. I walk over to Royal Street, where a jazz band is already playing to passing tourists, and head to Cafe Beignet. Established in 1990, this famous restaurant is known for its beignets (of course!) – flat squares of fried dough powdered with sugar. I bite into the sweet, crisp dough and wash it down with a cup of hot café au lait.
International influences
My beignet was the perfect French bite to enjoy in the French Quarter. Actually, just as the local cuisine represents a variety of international influences, the name “French Quarter” is a little misleading: it doesn’t describe the exciting mix of cultures that I see everywhere.
Established in 1718 by the French colonial administrator Jean-baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, New Orleans developed around the “Vieux Carré,” the original name for the French Quarter. In 1803, after years of alternating French and Spanish rule, the city was bought from France by the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase – a land deal in which the U.S. bought the whole colony of Louisiana for $15 million.
Two great fires in the 18th century destroyed many of the original buildings. Those you see here today are mostly Spanish colonial in style, with brightly painted walls and cast-iron balconies.
As I stroll through the lively streets of the quarter – 13 blocks long and six blocks wide – I think about the different ethnic groups that made New Orleans what it is. While much of the U.S. was being colonized by the British, the French and Spanish were shaping life in this part of the continent, which is almost surrounded by water and was therefore isolated from the rest of the country.
The taste of multiculturalism
Geographically, New Orleans is at the bottom of America’s Deep South but at the top of the
Caribbean world. In the 1800s, this was an important port city for goods from the Caribbean islands, such as sugar cane, rum, and tobacco. Another import that came through the city, tragically, were human beings from West Africa. The city was home to the biggest slave market in the U.S. Between 1804 and 1862, more than 100,000 people were bought and sold here.
Over the years, the population diversified to include people from many different ethnic backgrounds: French, Spanish, West African (both slaves and free people), Native American, AngloAmerican, German, Italian, Irish, and more. Each group brought its own way of cooking, and these combined to develop into a unique cuisine.
The diversity of the city’s past is reflected in the modern-day French Quarter. Dating from 1840, the city’s oldest restaurant, Antoine’s, is located here, and there are many new restaurants serving everything from Asian fusion to Mexican tacos. On just one street, I pass an expensive restaurant with tables draped in white linen; a lively Irish pub that offers the famous Hurricane cocktail “to go” (New Orleans is one of the few cities in the U.S. where you’re allowed to drink alcohol on the streets); and a “hole in the wall,” where you can order a “po’boy,” a traditional Louisiana sandwich stuffed with fried seafood or meat.
“French Quarter” doesn’t describe the exciting mix of cultures that I see everywhere”
Creole or Cajun?
For lunch, I decide to try a New Orleans favorite: the muffuletta, a sandwich filled with deli meats, cheeses, and an olive salad. I order it in the pretty courtyard of Napoleon House, a famous restaurant in the French Quarter. The restaurant got its name because the original owner of the building is said to have offered it to the exiled French leader Napoleon Bonaparte as a place of refuge.
Surrounded by tropical plants, I bite into my muffuletta. Invented at the Central Grocery in the French Quarter, it’s served toasted here, with melted cheese. Delicious!
Two of the terms I see most on menus in the French Quarter are “Creole” and “Cajun.” Local food expert Dylan O’donnell explains to me that these terms describe two very different styles of cooking. O’donnell is the owner of Doctor Gumbo Tours, which offers guided walking tours of the French Quarter that focus on New Orleans’s rich food and cocktail history.
As he takes tourists on a culinary adventure and introduces them to some of the best dishes served in the French Quarter, Dylan often explains the origins of the terms, “Creole” and “Cajun.” Louisiana Creoles are thought to be descendants of the people who lived in Louisiana while it was still ruled by the French and the Spanish, before it became part of the U.S. Most Creoles were Catholics, speaking French, Spanish, or a French-based language called Louisiana Creole. Some still practice the same religion and speak their traditional language today.
Cajuns, on the other hand – also known as Acadians – are descendants of a colony of French people who settled in 1604 in an area called Acadia (now Nova Scotia, Canada). After being forced out of their homeland by the British in the mid-18th century, Acadians were sent to France, Britain, and the Caribbean, as well as to British colonies on the east coast of North America. Many of them traveled further, making their way to south Louisiana.
These people were hunters and farmers, Dylan O’donnell tells me, and didn’t want to live in New Orleans. “So they settled outside of the city, south of the city but mostly west. About a three-hour drive west of New Orleans, you’ll find yourself in a cultural region known as Acadiana. The word ‘Cajun’ itself is simply an English bastardization of ‘Acadian.’”
Two styles of cooking
No visit to the French Quarter would be complete without a stroll through Jackson Square, overlooked by St. Louis Cathedral. On one side of the cathedral is the Cabildo; on the other, the Presbytère. Both buildings are home to impressive museums.
What catches my attention, however, are the delicious-looking dishes being served at a restaurant called Gumbo Shop. The sign outside promises Creole cuisine, and the menu includes New Orleans favorites such as gumbo and jambalaya. The aromatic base for jambalaya, gumbo, étouffée, and many other local dishes, is what’s known as the “holy trinity” in both Creole and Cajun cooking: onions, bell peppers, and celery, finely chopped and sautéed in oil.
Gumbo and jambalaya contain similar ingredients – meat or seafood and rice – but are prepared in different ways. O’donnell tells me that the difference between the two styles of cooking is directly linked to the places where the original Creoles and Cajuns lived. The ingredients that were available to them influenced the types of cuisine they developed.
Living in the city, Creoles had access to exotic ingredients and were influenced by the refined cuisine of the early European colonists. The Cajuns, on the other hand, lived in the countryside, by the swamps, and on the prairies. They ate wild animals, such as raccoons, squirrels, and alligators, and used heavy bell peppers and spices to improve the flavor of the meat and to preserve it.
O’donnell sums it up like this for me: “Creole [versions of these dishes are] going to be more European-influenced and refined, while Cajun is