Seven Days on the Dawn and Christmas in New Orleans: A Review

I wanna cruise the Dawn badly but my mom thinks she only likes megaships.

Kids these days!

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

A fantastic review and glad you described Nola. It's one I'd my fav cities. John Besh's Luke restaurant is amazing. The Court of Two Sister is another great place in the quarter.

 

I wanna cruise the Dawn badly but my mom thinks she only likes megaships.

 

Thanks for taking the time to share! Go Steelers!

I typically prefer the larger ships too, but I really thought the Dawn felt like a large ship, even though she isn't. The amount of food choice, activities, and the like made it feel like a very lively cruise, despite the ship being small. For us, it was a perfect blend of large ship amenities and small ship feel.

Oh no. No bad experiences. I am a big fan of Johnny's PoBoys.

Me three !

Day 12: A Scavenger Hunt Through the Quarter and a Lackluster Final Dinner

Our last day of vacation turned out to be another laid back day. We again slept late, which was probably the reason we were unable to get a table at Café du Monde that morning.

The week between Christmas and New Years must be a very popular time to visit New Orleans, because Jackson Square (and the Quarter in general) was bumping on Boxing Day morning. Since the line at Café du Monde seemed to stretch all the way across the square, we opted to skip breakfast and go straight to lunch.

As I’ve already mentioned, we stopped at the acclaimed Johnny’s Po’boys, and I’ll tell you, it is acclaimed for good reason. I had the roast beef with debris gravy, and it was sensational. My wife had an oyster po’boy, and she said it was the best she’d ever had. For breakfast, for lunch, it doesn’t matter—these delicious sandwiches should be eaten at all times, whenever possible.

After our po’boy breakfast, we set out on what I’ve come to think of as our New Orleans scavenger hunt. If you browse the tourist shops in New Orleans, you’ll likely see Cajun Power products, typically their garlic sauce. Before our trip, we’d been told by a friend who used to live in Louisiana that we ought to find Cajun Power’s Worcestershire Sauce, which is supposed to be a more delicious version of classic Worcestershire. Now, we love Worcestershire, so the thought of a Cajun version set our hearts a flutter, and we decided that we must have it.

Our first stop was at the New Orleans School of Cooking, right across the street from Johnny’s. We did one of their cooking classes on our last trip and had a great time (I highly recommend doing this on your trip to New Orleans), and they have a shop that sells Cajun cooking products and supplies. Unfortunately, they were all sold out of the Worcestershire, so we had to continue the hunt.

We browsed the shops around Jackson Square and the French Market to no avail. We decided to take a leisurely stroll down the river and check out the shops in the Riverwalk. Unfortunately, none of those stores had any Cajun Power Worcestershire either.

We did stop for some beignets at the Riverwalk location of Café du Monde. While the beignets were delicious, and the line was certainly much shorter, it did lack the atmosphere of the original. Still, if you need that beignet fix, as I often do, it’s nice to keep that location in mind.

We walked back to our hotel along the river, enjoying the slight refuge it provided from the oppressive humidity. We stopped in a market along the way, but still had no luck with finding the allusive Cajun Power Worcestershire.

It wasn’t until we got back to the hotel that we hit upon a winner. My wife remembered walking by another cooking school, so I called them to find out if they had the prize we’d been after all day. And, lucky for us, they did!

After a short rest, we headed back out for a pre-dinner snack of more oysters. Along the way, we stopped to buy our Cajun Power Worcestershire! We’ve yet to use it, so I don’t know if the hunt was worth it.

Our oyster sampling for the day was at another popular destination, Felix’s Restaurant and Oyster Bar, which is right across the street from Acme. There was a short ten-minute wait, and since we were only planning on grabbing a dozen oysters, we agreed to take seats at the bar.

It turned out to be a fun bar to sit at, as they are constantly shucking oysters right behind the bar. Also fun, they continuously gave out raw oysters (my wife got three, I think), perhaps as a way of rewarding the people who agree to take a bar spot rather than wait for a table. The oysters (both grilled and raw) were excellent—probably my second favorite after Acme. They are very similar to the Acme version, so if Acme has a really long line, by all means head to Felix’s and enjoy a similar experience.

Shucking oysters.

Felix's char-grilled delights.

Felix's, in the raw.

Unfortunately, we’d reached my least favorite point of vacation: the time to pack to go home. We headed back to the hotel and, with little fuss, got our stuff packed and ready for the journey home the following day.

We still had one meal left in New Orleans, this time at Emeril Lagasse’s NOLA Restaurant. Sadly though, this turned out to be our least favorite meal of the entire trip.

I can’t really find a single good thing to say about this meal. The service was terrible, all the food was lukewarm to cold, and, at least to me, the food didn’t taste anything like what I expect classic Cajun dishes to taste like—and I feel like I’ve eaten enough of them by now to know what they should taste like. The gumbo, for example, tasted nothing like what a good gumbo should taste like. It tasted more like a tomato-sauce-based soup, containing none of the rich, nutty, burnt flavor of good gumbo. Likewise, the barbeque shrimp tasted super weird—more like a sweet glazed shrimp, rather than the mouth-watering combination of spicy butter and garlic I’d come to know and love. Their version of wood oven oysters was basically inedible, which was extremely disappointing.

Needless to say, I would recommend you go just about anywhere else in New Orleans. This bums me out, as we’ve always enjoyed Emeril on TV, but he’s clearly left his restaurant in the wrong hands.

My goodbye to New Orleans wouldn’t be complete without at least one more stop at Pat O’s. We were able to sit in the piano bar this time, and we spent a very enjoyable hour or so listening to music and reflecting on what an awesome trip we’d had.

The subpar dinner did have one silver lining: I had plenty of belly room for late-night beignets. Jackson Square had quieted down some, and we enjoyed relaxing in the (relatively) cool evening air, eating one last round of sugary treats.

Finally, it came time for us to head back to our hotel and bed, facing the fact that we had to return to reality the next day. We had an incredible trip, from our time in one of my favorite cities in the world, to a week on the fantastic NCL Dawn. While on the cruise, we had already started planning our next vacation, and it was easier to return home—already filled with excitement for our next adventure.

Well folks, after about 15,000 words/45 pages in Word, that about does it. Thank you all for reading along as I relived my excellent vacation. I hope it was helpful and not too dull (or too food-centric). My next trip is going to be a two week treck through Europe, so I'm hoping to top 100 pages with that review.

Until then, whether you'll be traveling in New Orleans or on the Dawn, I hope you all have just as good a time as I did on this journey.

Cheers,

Paul

Emeril's cooking is creole, not cajun. Creole is more of a tomato based food. I'm like you, I prefer cajun over creole. Take a look at the differences and you'll see that Emeril is cooking creole. I cannot explain about the service and food temp though! Sorry you did't enjoy your last meal in NOLA. Great trip review Sir!

http://www.louisianatravel.com/articles/cajun-vs-creole-food-what-difference

Thank you, Paul, for sharing your adventures! We are headed out to NOLA in a few days and sailing on the Dawn! Your review has got my anticipation level on high! Thanks again!

Terri Lee

On the Dawn in less than 3 weeks and so excited to follow your review! Thank you for taking the time to do it.

Thanks for this awesome review. We are sailing the Dawn this weekend and cannot wait!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G935A using Tapatalk

Thank you very much for writing this review, and to your wife for her photos; I have thoroughly enjoyed reading about your adventures and experiences.

I loved your report and will be looking for your next one about Europe. Thank you for taking the time to post such an interesting and detailed report.

Thank you all for your kind comments.

For those of you about to cruise on the Dawn, have a wonderful time, and eat a beignet or two for me!

Cheers.

After our po’boy breakfast, we set out on what I’ve come to think of as our New Orleans scavenger hunt. If you browse the tourist shops in New Orleans, you’ll likely see Cajun Power products, typically their garlic sauce. Before our trip, we’d been told by a friend who used to live in Louisiana that we ought to find Cajun Power’s Worcestershire Sauce, which is supposed to be a more delicious version of classic Worcestershire. Now, we love Worcestershire, so the thought of a Cajun version set our hearts a flutter, and we decided that we must have it.

 

Our first stop was at the New Orleans School of Cooking, right across the street from Johnny’s. We did one of their cooking classes on our last trip and had a great time (I highly recommend doing this on your trip to New Orleans), and they have a shop that sells Cajun cooking products and supplies. Unfortunately, they were all sold out of the Worcestershire, so we had to continue the hunt.

 

We browsed the shops around Jackson Square and the French Market to no avail. We decided to take a leisurely stroll down the river and check out the shops in the Riverwalk. Unfortunately, none of those stores had any Cajun Power Worcestershire either.

http://www.cajunpowersauce.com/store/cajun-worcestershiresauce.html

OR the next time you cruise from New Orleans if you take a walk down Julia to Barrone pop into the Rouse's and they should have it.

My personal favorites are their Garlic Power and the Spaghetti Sauce. I'm working on some leftovers made with the sauce right now.

Cajunpower makes so many good things!!! I am very fortunate to get anything they make, because they are made in my hometown!!!! Thank you for your nice review!!!!

http://www.cajunpowersauce.com/store/cajun-worcestershiresauce.html

 

OR the next time you cruise from New Orleans if you take a walk down Julia to Barrone pop into the Rouse's and they should have it.

 

My personal favorites are their Garlic Power and the Spaghetti Sauce. I'm working on some leftovers made with the sauce right now.

It's funny, because while we were there we looked it up online and saw we could order it. But, for whatever reason, we just got it in to our heads that we really wanted to find it while we were in town and save on shipping. The thrill of the hunt, or something like that.

It's funny, because while we were there we looked it up online and saw we could order it. But, for whatever reason, we just got it in to our heads that we really wanted to find it while we were in town and save on shipping. The thrill of the hunt, or something like that.

No I totally get it, I drive 240 miles or so to get a seasoning that I can't seem to find online at a little Cajun grocery store in Scott, LA. So I know the thrill of the hunt.

Thanks again for the awesome review. I hope you and your wife have a wonderful cruise to the Mediterranean and I look forward to reading about it when you get back. [emoji846]

Sent from my iPhone using Forums mobile app