Jazz Fest

On my last day in New Orleans, several of us headed over to the Fair Grounds to check out the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, aka Jazz Fest.

I've never been all that clear on the difference between jazz and blues and soul and funk and gospel and so on, but after spending some time in the different stage areas, I concluded that I was most fond of the performances at the blues tent. The sound reminds me of the hip-hop and R&B that I'm more familiar with, but it's a bit more mellow. In fact, although I was definitely enjoying the music, I nearly nodded off a few times while listening to Guitar Slim Jr. and Kenny Neal.

In addition to the music, there were lots of interesting arts & crafts type displays. The people at one booth were making a quilt signed by people attending Jazz Fest (they had last year's quilt on display), so we signed a square or two. Another sold jewelry made from the scales of (some pretty scary-looking) garfish.

Of course, there was also tons of Cajun & Creole food: crawfish bread, all kinds of po' boys, etouffee, BBQ, jambalaya, and the ever-present beignets, with lots of catfish and crawfish in everything. I limited myself to some crawfish beignets and a "boudin" link. Coming from San Francisco, I've always associated "boudin" with sourdough, but apparently in New Orleans a boudin is a pork and rice sausage. Interesting, but not my favorite; I felt like the rice diluted the taste of the pork.

We had to leave around 3pm in order to catch our flights, but it was starting to get overcrowded anyway, so I wasn't too bummed about leaving; by then, we'd already had three or four hours to enjoy the good food and good music.