Editor’s Picks

Beading Rhythms

New Orleans is a gumbo of people of all different nationalities and races and all those people show a lot of love to each other,” says artist and Mardi Gras Indian Big Chief Demond Melancon. “I’m part of that gumbo.”…

Floating Along

My mother always sewed my Mardi Gras costumes growing up, leaving room for turtlenecks and T-shirts should the weather turn cold. One never knows what Louisiana winters will bring. The weekend could prove warm and mild, our faces basking in…

Farther Flung: The Path of History

There’s so much on the horizon for Natchez this year.  Dunleith, the historic plantation with its sprawling estate and cozy fine dining restaurant, opens this spring after a long renovation. The historic home built in 1885 was acquired by the…

Raisin’ Cane (Syrup)

Cane syrup, once known as New Orleans syrup, is a product particularly associated with Louisiana. Historically, it was a sweetener made on small family farms by grinding sugarcane and boiling down the juice to make syrup. During World War I,…

Kitchen Gourmet: Chicken Dance

Chicken is to a cook what an empty canvas is to a painter. It suggests infinite possibilities, limited only by one’s imagination and talent. There have probably been more culinary improvisations involving chicken than most any other ingredient, in part…

Go With Your Gut

It takes a lot of courage to launch a new culinary brand, but for Kaitlynn Fenley and Jon Scott Chachere, the creative couple has guts down to a science. As an informative wellness blog-turned-fermented foods brand, Cultured Guru is backed…

Beach Vibes

Summer’s here and the beaches are calling. Coastal Alabama is not only open for business but offers plenty of ways to get outside and stay at least six feet away from others. There are 60 miles of Gulf beaches and…

Nature Heals

Mark Elliott had spent 70 straight days working in his kayak outfitter warehouse after having to send five of his employees home due to COVID-19. Spring was usually a time when interest in paddling surged, but the phones weren’t ringing…

Louisiana Made: Arts and Sciences

You see a lot of things out in the wild, but if nothing else, Sandra Walkin believes in resurrection. Reaching out beyond her sun-drenched, glassed-in porch, thousands of pines, pecans, winged elms, river birches and more stand as towering reminders…

Staycationing in the Atchafalaya

Summer adventure awaits in one of Louisiana’s most impressive and diverse outdoor spaces   Chalk it up to the impressive statistics, the 200 species of birds and incredible sports fishing and hunting. The massive Atchafalaya River Basin tops all U.S.…

In The Footsteps of Bonnie & Clyde

  During their crime spree in the early 1930s, the law despised Bonnie Elizabeth Parker and Clyde Chestnut Barrow, known as the outlaw gang, Bonnie & Clyde. The couple murdered at least nine police officers and four civilians as they…

Louisiana Made: Well Armed

Rounding the corner past a path of palms, ferns and lilies in the expanse of the greenhouse, Harper runs beaming, her arms waving wide like falcon wings. The young girl refuses to take off her new jacket; she pleads with…

Drastic Measures

The Louisiana coast is many things to many people. Home. A livelihood. Vacation. Beauty. A breath of fresh air. With over 7,000 miles of squiggly coastline — more than any other U.S. state besides Alaska and Florida — Louisiana waterways…

Crawfish Recipes

It’s the height of crawfish season, and as much as we love our weekly crawfish boils, we also enjoy those little crustaceans in other preparations. For a change of pace, try a crawfish etouffée enriched with shrimp and lump crabmeat,…

Art: Preserving (Art) History

The long-neglected and nearly-forgotten “Fountain of the Four Winds” — one of Louisiana’s most spectacular, yet controversial Great Depression-era New Deal works of art located at the New Orleans Lakefront Airport — is at last being restored to its former…

Carnival in New Roads

By the time the 2020 Carnival season reaches its climax on Mardi Gras, Feb. 25, numerous Louisiana cities and towns will have wrapped up their perennial schedules of pre-Lenten parades, balls and other festivities. In one community, however, all proverbial…

Palmetto Island a Great Fall Getaway

The week’s forecast called for rain, then a dip below freezing, but Monday’s weather was warm and inviting. We decided to get outdoors and enjoy Louisiana’s autumn before winter arrived, driving south past the quaint town of Abbeville and vacant…

Louisiana Made: Pitcher Perfect

If you’re speeding or texting you’ll probably miss it, but tucked away in a beige block of industrial-looking storehouses off a small side road in Hammond, stands what the Brewers Association has twice named one of the 50 fastest-growing craft…

Best Hunting in the State

Hunting is inextricably woven into the wild fabric of Louisiana’s heritage and culture. A harsh land when first settled, hunting was a necessity of subsistence as well as commerce. The wide diversity of habitat and abundance of game and birds…

Traveler: Double Down

Casinos are now scattered liberally across Louisiana’s landscape and cityscapes, offering entertainment of many kinds. Since the actual gambling part of gaming houses is pretty much the same everywhere — you do split 8’s against dealer’s 10; you don’t get…

Best Hunting in the State

Hunting is inextricably woven into the wild fabric of Louisiana’s heritage and culture. A harsh land when first settled, hunting was a necessity of subsistence as well as commerce. The wide diversity of habitat and abundance of game and birds…

Cooling Off Along I-49

  I travel the state constantly and for years would pass a state-run rest area between Lafayette and Alexandria that accompanied a large lake surrounded by bald cypress, tupelo trees and a small hardwood forest. It’s a lovely area despite…