New Orleans' best bars

Almost forgot to blog this: the staff at Gambit Weekly was nice enough to ask me to contribute to their cover story on New Orleans' Top 50 Bars. The selection process was a ton of fun -- it took three lunches and a lot of emails and phone calls, as well as visits to prospective taverns; I think the list was winnowed down from something like 200 candidates.

Consensus seems to be that it's a pretty good list, though of course people are talking about their favorite places that didn't make the cut, or questioning the placement of a few that did. And there's the usual suspicion of advertisers influencing the list; they didn't, as anyone can see who picks up a hard copy of the issue.

Here's how the Top 10 shook out:

1. Mimi's in the Marigny
2. Napoleon House
3. One Eyed Jacks
4. The Delachaise
5. Cooter Brown's Tavern
6. d.b.a.
7. Maple Leaf
8. Rivershack Tavern
9. Ernie K-Doe's Mother-in-Law Lounge
10. Arnaud's French 75

Thoughts? What did we miss?

Comments

[Jil]

Coop's! How can you not love a bar where the bartender runs the place with an iron fist?

I always remember going in there when the Final Four basketball tournament was on. The TV over the bar was playing "Jurassic Park", and everyone was ignoring it.

A young couple in matching outfits and with their basketball tickets hung around their necks came in, sat down, and ordered beer. Then the guy turned to the bartender and yelled, "Hey! Let's get the game on here!"

The bartender looked at the TV, looked at everyone ignoring it, looked back up at the TV, look over at the guy, hooked his thumb backwards and said, "Folks are watching this."

[Lizzy Caston]

Woo-hoo. That sounds like a fun assignment. I've been in training (training my liver that is) for Tales of the Cocktail in two weeks. See you soon Kevin, until then....cheers