I just discovered a brilliant local website, go green nola, that compounds ideas and suggestions to lead a organic and healthier lifestyle at a local level.

This site has a great New Orleans recycling guide, a local farmers directory and art market calendar, tips for reducing waste, environmental tax incentive information, and an “eat local challenge” which supports the “death to the 1500-mile ceaser salad movement”. The features and comprehensive “green lifestyle” information are endless. Read the rest of this entry »

On a bright blue fall day with just enough cool air that locals were wearing long sleeves and jackets, a national conservation group broke ground Wednesday on a $2 million project in New Orleans City Park. Although it marked the official start of this park renovation, fundraising for the project has been underway for more than a year.

The Trust for Public Lands, (TPL) a nonprofit land conservation group headquartered in San Francisco, started seeking donations in 2006 when it announced that it would spearhead an effort to refurbish the 50 acres surrounding Big Lake Trail and Meadow, located just off the Lelong Avenue entrance to the park and near the New Orleans Museum of Art. When the project is completed in spring of 2009, the area will provide a walking and bicycle path, a dock with boat rentals and additional landscaping including more trees, a meadow and gazeboes for friends and family gatherings. Read the rest of this entry »

I happen to live within walking distance of my two favorite sausage makers in New Orleans – the Creole Country sausage plant on David Street, well hidden down a side street and built out from an old shotgun house; and the deli counter of Terranova Supermarket on Esplanade Avenue, a classic corner market run by the same family since 1925. I insist this proximity is a coincidence, but it certainly is convenient for someone who has more than a passing interest in the meat grinder’s produce. When I want to make a Monday pot of red beans, I can dash over to Terranova and get a pound of fresh hot sausage to spike things up. Their Italian is peerless. And Creole Country? Gaw, where to start? The place turns out an amazing array of pork products, including a hogshead cheese that is so good even people who “don’t like” hogshead cheese make an exception when I put a block of it out at parties. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve never been able to speak a foreign language. I took four years of high school French and can still barely even mutter “Bonjour,” without a weird southern drawl making it hardly distinguishable as one of the most recognizable French greetings. I traveled to Paris in the nineties but, I lazily relied on the ability to always find someone who spoke English. Although I do not understand the language, I adore Paris. It is a city like no other where life can be whimsical, seductive, gloomy, romantic and haunting all at once. There are few cities that Read the rest of this entry »