A primer on New Orleans seafood, tracing the Gulf’s oysters, shrimp, fish, crab, crawfish and alligator from old oyster bars and neighborhood fish frys to markets, po’boy shops and white-tablecloth restaurants.

An Irish Channel institution since 1952, Parasol’s Bar and Restaurant nearly closed for good in 2019. Today, the beloved New Orleans watering hole lives on with roast beef po’ boys, neighborhood regulars, and one of the city’s most storied St. Patrick’s Day traditions.

At Banh Mi Boys, Peter Nguyen brings together two New Orleans sandwich icons: the banh mi and the po’ boy. Inspired by his Vietnamese family’s gas station restaurant and the city’s Viet-Cajun food scene, Nguyen serves classic sandwiches alongside playful mashups like Cajun garlic butter shrimp banh mi and Korean fried chicken.

A female-run seafood market and restaurant in New Orleans making lesser-known Gulf fish approachable through po’ boys, fresh cuts, and direct sourcing from local fishermen.

A purple corner store beneath the Claiborne overpass, Manchu feeds New Orleans far beyond convenience. Famous for its crackly fried chicken, shrimp fried rice, and yaka mein, the Vietnamese-owned staple sits at the crossroads of Tremé and the Seventh Ward, where Asian-Creole cooking, neighborhood ritual, and community care come together, day after day.

At Fritai in Tremé, chef Charly Pierre gives long-overdue visibility to the deep culinary ties between Haiti and New Orleans. Through plantains, griyo, epis, and mirliton, the restaurant tells a story of shared history, migration, and flavor — and makes the case for why Haitian food belongs at the center of the city’s table.

New Orleans’s king cake is a culinary symbol of Mardi Gras and the festive, months-long lead-up known as Carnival season. Beginning on January 6 and continuing until the season’s culmination on Fat Tuesday – this year taking place on March 4 – revelers across the region enjoy slice after slice of this traditional, cinnamon-flavored cake. Whoever finds the small, plastic baby figurine hidden inside is said to receive good luck, but must also purchase the next king cake.

Step into Dooky Chase Restaurant, where gumbo fed Civil Rights leaders, art lines the walls like a living archive, and Leah Chase’s Creole cooking still anchors the Tremé. A Carnival-season visit reveals how one dining room shaped American history, one bowl at a time.

Every king cake has a story, and some bakers choose to weave a part of their personal journey into the ones they serve in the months and weeks leading up to Mardi Gras. Norma’s Sweets Bakery is one example of this culinary storytelling. Across its two locations – one in the Kenner suburb and a second in New Orleans’ Mid-City – the Castillo family has baked their Honduran immigrant heritage into a new Carnival staple.

Jambalaya, the rice dish that stands at the crossroads of culture and cuisine, is a staple of celebration, mourning and everything in between in Louisiana. From tailgates to Mardi Gras to repasts and backyard cookouts, it is a ubiquitous food that can be a main or a side dish. The roots of the dish can be traced to West African jollof rice, as well as Spanish paella. At its essence, jambalaya is an odds-and-ends dish that feeds a multitude, a humble rice dish with some meat and/or seafood cooked into it by way of a flavorful broth. As for the origins of the name jambalaya, there are as many theories as the grains of rice contained within. Some believe it to come from the Provençal word jambalaia, which means a mishmash.

Kirk and Kerry, brother and sister, are the heart and soul of Frady’s One Stop Food Store, a Bywater neighborhood institution that has been around in some shape or form since 1889. After a typically busy lunch rush, the duo sit at a table outside the yellow-painted shop, watching over their quiet corner of New Orleans. They shout hello to an older neighbor as he totters by. Kerry notices his limp and asks Kirk about it.

When longtime locals discuss contenders for “best all-around po’boy shop in all of New Orleans,” R&O’s is usually an integral part of the conversation. Fans of the stalwart seafood house located a literal stone’s throw from Lake Pontchartrain will wax poetic about a wide variety of the menu’s delectable standouts – Italian salads studded with tangy chopped giardiniera, oversized stuffed artichokes, seasonal boiled seafoods – before they even start talking po’boys. However, once the conversation turns to the city’s signature long-sandwich, the accolades come in fast and strong. Want a classic shrimp, oyster or soft-shell crab po’boy? They’ll arrive overstuffed, crunchy and fried to juicy perfection.

When it comes to where to eat in New Orleans, food is the primary language. A bowl of gumbo is not a recipe; it’s a novel of history, migration, and survival. This is a city that communicates its deepest truths – about joy, resilience, community, and conflict – through what it cooks. To eat here is to participate in a conversation that has been going on for 300 years. An essential New Orleans restaurant does more than serve a great meal. It provides a kind of spiritual and cultural nourishment, reminding the city of who it is, where it came from, and where it’s going. Our aim here is not simply to point you to good food, but to share with you places both close to our heart and our hope for the future of the city. They might not always be glamorous – the best booze can come in a plastic to-go cup and life-altering crawfish from a folding table in a parking lot. But they are all honest: neighborhood anchors, family legacies, or community hubs.

New Orleans is full of surprises, but the beauty of Domilise’s is that it’s exactly what you’d expect from a po’boy joint. Located uptown on Annunciation Street, the yellow house on the corner has been serving up food for the neighborhood along the Mississippi Riverbend for over a hundred years. We watch as customers line up below the hand-painted wood sign to get a taste of straightforward sustenance. There are no shortcuts here: tasty “debris” – the tender bits of meat that fall off a roast beef – are cooked for hours into gravy before Mary Lou and her team generously ladle it atop crisp loaves of Leidenheimer (a local brand of French bread that’s been around even longer than Domilise’s).

In April 1965, Rocky Tommaseo and his brother, Tommy, teamed with Carlo Gioe and his two brothers, Mario and Giuseppe. Together, they opened Rocky & Carlo’s, a restaurant that would become an institution in Chalmette – a town about 10 miles east of New Orleans. But the partnership between these two families was already solidified by the time they arrived in southeastern Louisiana. “Our story began in Sicily,” said a younger Tommy Tommaseo, who everyone calls “Mr. Tommy.” He is the son of Rocky and nephew of the older Tommy. At 75 years old, Mr. Tommy is part of the second generation of Rocky & Carlo’s ownership. Two families merged, he said, in the coastal town of Alcamo.