French Quarter Gumbo


If you take a little French influence, some Spanish architecture, plenty of narrow streets, mix in cultures from Arcadia, Africa, Europe and America, toss in a healthy dose of Jazz and let it blend for about 300 years you come up with the French Quarter.

The Quarter is unique in the U.S. and with over 10 million visitors a year, one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world.   The original city of New Orleans, which we know today as the French Quarter, was laid out in a 13x16 block grid pattern along the Mississippi river by Pierre Le Blond de La Tour in 1722.  The twisting of the river at this point both gives the city one of it's nicknames "The Crescent City", and brings us to the first problem we need to talk about before we begin our tour...

Directions

Anyone that has stood along the Mississippi and watched the sun come up over, what is called here, the west bank of the river knows that asking for directions is going to involve more than North, South, East and West.  Commonly when you ask for directions in New Orleans you will hear references to Uptown, Downtown, Riverside and Lakeside. If you ask the same question in the French Quarter they may throw in Canalside and Esplanadeside or things like Upper Quarter and Lower Quarter!  Confused yet?

Looking at a map of the Quarter, by the way you can click on the image here for a better view and use your browser's back button to return, the terms Canalside, Esplanadeside, Riverside and Lakeside become pretty easy to figure out.  As for the rest the Quarter is divided into two sections - Upper (the more commercial section between Canal street and St Ann street) and Lower (the more residential section between St Ann street and Esplanade Ave.).

So, now if you are in the 300 block of Bourbon street and ask someone how to get to "Pat O's" and they say "head down Bourbon toward Esplanade, turn Riverside on St Peter you will see it in the middle of the block Canalside" you can find it no problem right?

Oh yeah, one more thing - if you have a unique city and an unusual way of giving directions there is bound to be other differences right?  Well, Nawlins does have a "little" different way of speaking...

Here are a few terms to help you get started...

Bayou (by-you)
A marshy tributary of a River or Lake.

Beignets (bin-yea)
A French deep-fried square doughnut dusted with powdered sugar.

Cajun (cay-jen)
In the 1760's a group of french acadianns were exiled from Nova Scotia and

The copyright of the article French Quarter Gumbo in French Quarter is owned by G. L. Tyrrell. Permission to republish French Quarter Gumbo in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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