From Denny: The Olympics, both in sport TV and politics, loomed large in the minds of cartoonists this week. Sadly, the world did lose one accomplished Olympian, Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili of Bakuriani, 21 years old, this week in a dangerous practice. The whole world mourns with his country.
The Vancouver Olympics have had a tough start this year with warmer weather than usual and the very reason for the venue to be held in Canada was because of the expected good snowfall. Instead, the stuff melted off while America got blasted with the extreme snow weather. Guess Washington, D. C. should have been the host of the Winter Olympics this crazy weather year. The big joke in America was to export snow to Canada for a hefty price - or for free if only they would do all the shoveling.
Tiger Woods read from a stilted lectern a half-hearted stilted apology ordered up by his publicists, agents and family horrified he was allowing half a billion dollars slip through his hands because of his bizarre sexual conduct. Frankly, it didn't go over well with most.
He just isn't at that point in his life where he realizes that being emotionally stingy just doesn't go over well with most people. He has another reputation as an extremely cheap tipper which red flags his attitude toward other people that they are not deserving of respect or consideration. His bad attitudes saturate all areas of his life and those same attitudes are not going to evolve or change over night.
The cartoonists are still churning out the Tiger Woods cartoons and just getting in gear on this current subject of The Big Apology. It will be next week before those appear en masse.
On a lighter note, the cartoonists compared politics and the political parties to an Olympic sport. I've always said my favorite sport was politics. Why? Because it has such passionate fans and there are high stakes for how it can affect our daily lives.
Political partisanship has taken a toll on the better politicians who are quitting the field. Voters and colleagues alike are fed up with the Republicans acting like Tiger Woods all rolled into one: cavalier with every one's lives, thinking only about themselves and the whole world is centered around their whining wants.
Toyota got off pretty light this week from the cartoonists. Guess they wore it out the past couple of weeks. At least the Toyota president finally agreed to quit being such a jerk and appear before American investigations into the safety of their products.
Prez Obama is up to his neck in the usual stinky messes, still shoveling hard to clean up everything in sight all over the land of America. Jobs creation is still slow but not completely in the tank, but sure not helping out all the millions looking for jobs.
What occurred to me some time ago is that the American worker needs to get off our co-dependency on big corporations as career jobs. It's best to work a while for them, get the business model, grow up a bit to be mentally tough and then it's time to leave the nest and go out and grow your own smaller business. If anything, what it looks like from the perspective of the Big Picture is that the Universe is saying, "OK, all you wimpy lazy baby birds, time to exit the nest and start flying on your own whether you want to or not!" And she dumped millions of people out of their comfortable jobs with easy regular money, respect and authority only to have to reestablish themselves all over again.
Also, Prez Obama has endured a lot of pig squealing from China about meeting with the Dalai Lama at the White House. How childish can you get? They would look more like a super power if they grew up their attitude toward Tibet and the spiritual leader. Come to think of it, they could stand to grow up their attitude toward Taiwan as well. All it does is make them look like bullies stomping the little guys. Guess what; absolutely no one in the world respects that situation.
The cartoonists have had a field day with the First Lady's War on Childhood Obesity, a laudable goal. These cartoons really do reflect our national obsession with food, stress and lack of exercise. They are also funny!
Lastly, the snow was a big topic of conversation all across America and in the editorial cartoon sections of newspapers. It really is a metaphor for being buried deep in something difficult to deal with in our lives on so many levels...
NASA and science still twisting in the wind financially. Gee, maybe if they quit wasting so much money and had used it wisely the past four decades maybe they would not be experiencing cutbacks:
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From Denny: The weather is starting to cooperate and turn a bit warmer, melting all that annoying snow here and there. Your mind turns to "maybe I can wear real clothes now instead of piling on the winter gear." The clothing trend this Spring is frilly! Not to worry, it isn't weird or too girly but all grown up and sophisticated is the fashion take designers took on ruffles this year.
Designers have been playing with fabric like your toddler does with toys and having great fun. The result of their creativity is the modern update for ruffles is that the ruffle is longer, looser, even twisted and turned, creating very relaxed and easy to wear styles. For the unexpected are those nonperfect puckers that come across as elegant. The beauty of this modern take on ruffles is their versatility so you can dress them up or down: to work or on the weekends with jeans.
4 Styles of Frilly this season
Fashion-forward frills
Normally, the traditional ruffle is so excessive in its flourish that it is not considered work appropriate. However, the new abstract take this season on the ruffle makes it wearable to the office. If you are in a conservative environment with menswear-inspired as the rule this year's ruffle can give you a bit of a feminine twist for your wardrobe.
This new take on ruffles are larger folds that lie flat but add depth and movement yet without feeling frilly. Asymmetrical layers like these ruffles help soften structured suits and skirts and carve out some curves in all the right places. Make sure to add a belt to tame that possible volume on cardigans and blouses.
Featured in the video: Ruffled wrap top, $49, Loehmann's; Tiered ruffle skirt, $89.90, Zara.com
Pretty and preppy
Sometimes, casual wear can look just too plain vanilla and uninspired. This season focus on smaller details and update some of your casual cotten and easy knits to give them some flair with visual interest. Those tiny elements of texture on a simple T-shirt or a menswear button-down shirt with a tuxedo-like ruffle trim can do the trick without resorting to accessories.
Even this season's accessories are getting into the act with ruffles, puckers and pleats! Remember to keep your total look in mind and moderate just how much you embrace any new trend. A few touches of a good thing often create more stylish impact than too much flourish. Leave the excess to when you come down to visit me in south Louisiana and we blow it out over at the New Orleans Mardi Gras! :)
Featured in the video: Cascading Rose T-shirt, $45; Jcrew.com, Slim fit white jeans, $59.90, Mango.com; Deux lux ruffle handbag, $68, Urbanoutfitters.com
Trendy tiers
Some of the harsher, edgy and sharply tailored looks like biker jackets, knee-length boots and studded handbags are getting ruffles this season. Even if you might normally wear a very sleek look, a few items from this season's offerings can give your wardrobe that fluid flowing benefit that only a soft item can provide.
These new long layers look easy and modern, pairing well with tough fabrics and sharp tailoring, making you more approachable. Who wants to scare off a possible great mate? :) The reverse is true of the sharply tailored looks: they help balance soft flowing lines, taming a billowy look. I'm a big fan of contrast to create balance in a wardrobe. It keeps things interesting and people asking, "Where did you get that?"
Featured in the video: AK Anne Klein Blouse, $29.99, TJMaxx.com; Faux leather blazer, $24.95, Hm.com
In the Fall season we embraced structured, architectural styles. Well, this Spring season we all need a breather, something more whimsical and a bit softer. Don't even allow your mind to go to the typed cast vision of ruffles: little girls in pink poufy party dresses. This season ruffles grew up: think more classic muted tones like blush, rose and palest blues. Sophisticated colors build a stage for those perfect subtle details to be a stand out.
Check out how layered ruffles from delicious fabrics like lace and chiffon weave this airy transparency. It's those raw edges that give these vintage-inpsired versions their modernity. Even a trench coat gets cascading edges or a wonderful wrap gifts drama to a very simple classic black dress for that special occasion.
Featured in this video: Ruffle dress, $129, Zara.com; Silk ruffle trench, $228, Anntaylor.com
Check out how there are four different ways to wear this season's new take on frilly from style editor Bobbie Thomas who is also author of The Buzz column for In Touch Weekly. Explore with her new ways to embrace this textured trend!
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*** Mardi Gras and New Orleans is a quick tutorial in the Four D's: Debauchery, Decadence, Denial and Diets!
*** This is an excerpt from the full post over at my blog called The Social Poets. Be sure to check out the many great videos of Mardi Gras in New Orleans and more hilarious photos and great quotes: Funny Fat Tuesday Afterglow - Cheeky Quote Day 17 Feb 2010
From Denny: New Orleans has a particular fondness for lampooning the politically incorrect taboo subjects of sexuality, religion and death. This year they went at it full tilt and certainly did not disappoint.
These tacky photos will definitely make you laugh out loud. If you suffer from sexual prudishness you probably don't read my blogs but just in case, look away. Actually, it's pretty tame - but tacky stuff, not good taste - which is what New Orleans Mardi Gras is all about.
Anyway, I was doing that "wondering thing" about how to follow up the big party blowout of Fat Tuesday the day after when the thrill is gone. Of course, the Christian Lenten season has officially begun, a time to think of dialing it back on the excess meter and tuning ourselves to more inner reflection.
What better bridge than to laugh at the Four D's to get folks over their embarrassments from Mardi Gras that even their grandchildren will never hear the tales? The Four D's are Debauchery, Decadence, Denial and Diets. Enjoy the funny quotes, laugh 'til you fall off your chair Mardi Gras photos and news videos about the festival!
To keep your game face on, remember there is hope for the perpetual party person because this is the progression:
Debauchery is what you climb out of to get up to the next level of Decadence. You know, it's called graduating college and leaving behind your partying ways. So, you enter the oh, so adult life of Decadence known as credit cards, mortgages, shiny new cars, deep in debt and a few children dotting the backyard suburban landscape.
Before you know it you are done with Decadence after a decade or so and step up into the new house of Denial. Denial is when you experience Empty Nest Syndrome, hoping those screaming kids you so wanted to leave a few years earlier decide to come home to roost and make the house interesting again. Denial is also about figuring you might one day actually get to afford to retire. In those hopes you begin the process of trimming down your debt as your employer trims down your salary.
Eventually, you wake up and figure out you have to leave it all behind and go on a Diet to purge yourself of so much happy excess in order to function in life. What do you do? You retire, picking out your favorite destination and then go on perpetual holiday in New Orleans to begin the partying life all over again. And that, my friends, is why they call it the fast track Life Cycle... Oh, where did all the time go? :)
* May you - Work like you don't need the money, love like you've never been hurt, dance like no-one is watching, screw like its being filmed, and drink like a true Irishman. - Anonymous
* To call war the soil of courage and virtue is like calling debauchery the soil of love. - George Santayana
* I've been on a constant diet for the last two decades. I've lost a total of 789 pounds. By all accounts, I should be hanging from a charm bracelet. – Erma Bombeck
Some Serious Quotes about Denial to help us happily slide into the reflective mood of the new Lenten season:
* Evil, what is evil? There is only one evil, to deny life. – D. H. Lawrence
*** This is an excerpt from the full post over at my blog called The Social Poets. Be sure to check out the many great videos of Mardi Gras in New Orleans and more hilarious photos and great quotes: Funny Fat Tuesday Afterglow - Cheeky Quote Day 17 Feb 2010
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From Denny: There's a new book out with research from a study and recounting near death experience stories. It's from an author in my part of the country, Louisiana, Dr. Jeffrey Long who researched this subject and the new book is called "Evidence of the Afterlife."
Reincarnation, near death and after life experiences are often controversial, especially to those who have not experienced the phenomenon. Previously, medical researchers tried to explain away those experiences by declaring the brain was on overload while dying and that explains "the light." What they should have said is "I don't really know." One person's truth is not always someone else's truth - until it happens to them.
I applaud this doctor, a radiation oncologist, for daring to step out there and investigate this subject. He collected more than 1,300 stories from people all over the world.
He offers this book up as proof the afterlife exists, writing there are at least nine lines of evidence and here are two of those lines of proof:
1. People blind from birth have visual near death experiences.
2. His study was with young children with no previous knowledge of the subject, ages 5 to 9, and their near death experiences were identical to that of older children and adults.
Mary Jo Rapini recounts her experience in this video. Previous to her near death experience she had been a skeptic who worked with dying cancer patients who repeatedly told her of their experiences.
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*** New Orleans knows how to celebrate! Join the fun, listen to the rocking great Saints songs from hip hop to country, laugh at the outrageous costumes eagerly anticipated during Mardi Gras in the French Quarter, and, oh yeah, read some funny and serious Mardi Gras quotes to learn how the custom developed over time. Marvel at the resiliency of the people through tough times.
From Denny: Oh, to explain the Louisiana culture to someone who has never visited... :) It can get a bit raucous during the Mardi Gras Carnival season. The most family friendly parades are in Lafayette, the capital city of Baton Rouge and the smaller venues throughout the state if that's your preference.
Though since Hurricane Katrina many neighborhoods in New Orleans have organized their own more family friendly parades to counterbalance the general debauchery that tends to go on more from the tourists than the locals during Carnival season. Yeah, that's what we tell ourselves every year... :)
Right now Mardi Gras started early with the Super Bowl win of the Cinderella team the New Orleans Saints. What a celebration it is! The whole state stayed awake the night of the win as none of us could sleep even if we weren't partying in the French Quarter.
The word is over 270 Baton Rouge teachers called in sick Monday morning after the win because they partied just a little too much in New Orleans after the Super Bowl win. That's the beauty of living in Baton Rouge. Within an hour's drive you can party to the east in New Orleans or go west and party in Lafayette where they host some wonderful international music festivals.
Rocking great song captures the spirit of New Orleans:
The parade thrown last night for the Saints was nothing short of spectacular as Mardi Gras folks threw it together literally on a moment's notice. Trust me; no one in America, not even the Macy's Parade organization could have put together a full blown parade this fast. New Orleans is accustomed to living on the edge and rose to the occasion.
Country version of New Orleans song:
This video is from right before the Saints won against the Arizona Cardinals in a play-off game for the NFC Championship Title - after that was won another win against the Minnesota Vikings, sending the Saints to the Super Bowl - another unexpected win! Watch it just to learn about why the fans are wearing paper bags over their heads during the games. :)
Enjoy the funny costumes from Mardi Gras this year!
Funny Quotes
* I have 2,000 gospel singers and 35 Mardi Gras Indian tribes. You can't just call an agent and order them up.” - Quint Davis
* Mardi Gras starts tomorrow in New Orleans. Talk about perfect timing. Those truckloads of ice from FEMA just showed up. - Bill Maher
* This Mardi Gras will be a little different. This year when drunks yell up at the balcony, 'Show us your boobs!' Michael Brown and Michael Chertoff walk out. - Bill Maher
* Mardi Gras is going on in New Orleans. Actually it's scaled down quite a bit. Now when you throw a bead, women only flash one boob. - Jay Leno
* Tomorrow is Fat Tuesday, and of course, this being America, it will be followed by Even Fatter Wednesday, Obese Thursday and Fat-A$$ Friday. - Jay Leno
* It's Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Everybody has Mardi Gras fever. I was watching the 'Today' show earlier today and Tom Cruise was lecturing Matt Lauer about jambalaya. - David Letterman
* They have the big parade down in New Orleans and this year FEMA has a float, but it's not expected 'til labor day. - David Letterman
* In New Orleans, the Paris Casino reopened and officials are calling it a sign of progress. If you didn't lose your house before, you can now. - Jay Leno
* In his speech President Bush said we need to rebuild Iraq, provide the people with jobs, and give them hope. If it works there maybe we'll try it in New Orleans. - Jay Leno
* The first baby has been born in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Yeah, they named it FEMA because it finally showed up after nine months. - Jay Leno
* Pakistan had one of the worst natural disasters ever, up to 50,000 people dead after an earthquake this week. But of course it's not a resort, no supermodels like the tsunami, so it doesn't really get covered. But other nations are trying to help. They've offered food, medicine, corpse-sniffing dogs. New Orleans sent a volunteer team of cops to beat the crap out of survivors. - Bill Maher
* You know I love New Orleans, they're vowing to hold Mardi Gras this year come hell or -- no pun -- high water. This is interesting, they've always had a Mardi Gras drink called the Hurricane. They're not going to serve that this year, but they've got a new one called the FEMA. It's strong, it hits you about a week later. - Bill Maher
* They say the toxic water and sludge smells so bad in New Orleans that they're thinking of renaming the city Newark. - Jay Leno
* The president said much of the aid is going towards job training. And when they heard that, the people of New Orleans rose as one and said, 'Can we start with you?' - Bill Maher
* Bush called the rebuilding of New Orleans one of the largest reconstruction efforts the world has ever seen, second only to Cher. - Jay Leno
* The rebuilding of New Orleans is already underway. The relief and reconstruction contracts for rebuilding the city have already been awarded, many of them no bid. Among the recipients, major Republican contributors Bechtel and Fluor, the Shaw Group, client of Joe Allbaugh, ex-FEMA head, and, of course, come on, don't be shy, say it with me -- Halliburton. - Jon Stewart
* President Bush toured New Orleans. He saw something that was below sea level: his approval ratings. - Jay Leno
* Taking a page from their tsunami playbook, the White House announced today that former presidents Bush and Bill Clinton will head up the fundraising efforts for the hurricane relief. And you know, Bill Clinton is no stranger to this kind of thing. He was once visiting the French Quarter during a hurricane and got blown behind a dumpster. - Bill Maher
* But hey, it is New Orleans. Watching today, I could tell that this city has not lost its hope. It has not lost its distinctive pluck, because every time rescue teams would toss supplies to people, women flashed their breasts. - Bill Maher
These are some serious quotes. What Mark Twain, Louis Armstrong, Calvin Trillin and others have had to say about New Orleans's most raucous cultural ritual. These quotes describe the history, the culture, the visceral atmostphere of the New Orleans festival.
Cultural Quotes
* The Roman Carnival and other European Carnivals, all of which begin to be reported with frequency only in the 14th century, have no documentable connection with ancient [Greek and Roman] festivities.
It was easy enough for 15th and 16th century reformers to associate with pagan materialism and sensuality the boisterous games and bodily self-indulgence that developed in Carnival. From the 16th century onwards city and state authorities in both Catholic and Protestant areas sometimes found it useful to support the mistaken notion of pagan origins in their efforts to suppress the festival's disorderliness.
The Bacchanalia, Saturnalia, Lupercalia, and so on, however frequently they may be invoked in the Gulf Coast parades or in Sunday-supplement explanations of the festivity, have nothing to do with the historical origin of Mardi Gras or the origins of its origin in Europe's Carnivals. - Carnival, American Style: Mardi Gras at New Orleans and Mobile (University of Chicago Press, 1990), by Samuel Kinser
* At 9 o'clock, or thereabouts, the flare of torchlights shattered the darkness of Magazine and Julia Streets, bands burst into symphony, and the Mistick Krewe stood revealed — a company of demons, rich and realistic, moving in a procession that seemed to blaze from some secret chamber of the earth.
They came! Led by the festive Comus, high on his royal seat, and Satan, high on a hill, far blazing as a mount, with pyramids and towers from diamond quarries hewn, and rocks of gold; the palace of great Lucifer. The demon actors in Milton's Paradise Lost. The first torchlit scenic procession in New Orleans, a revolution in street pageantry, a revelation in artistic effects. - The Mistick Krewe: Chronicles of Comus and his Kin (Carnival Press, 1931), by Perry Young
* [In 1857,] the Mistick Krewe [Comus] introduced spectacle to the streets of New Orleans, and Carnival was forever changed. Comus would not only reappear every Mardi Gras night, he would do so amid flames and smoking flares of moving theater, and each year he would present new visions to astonish a population long nourished on masquerades, parades, and stagecraft. With the advent of the Mistick Krewe of Comus, the festivities of Mardi Gras were ended with public ceremony of pomp and bombast, with mystery, artistry, and ritual splendor. - Mardi Gras: New Orleans (Flammarion, 1997), by Henri Schindler
* The night cometh in which we take no note of time, and forget that we are living in a practical age which relegates romance to printed pages and merriment to the stage. Yet what is more romantic than the Night of the Masked Ball — the too brief hours of light, music, and fantastic merriment which seem to belong to no age and yet to all?
Somehow or other, in spite of all the noisy frolic of such nights, the spectacle of a Mardi Gras Ball impresses one at moments as a ghastly and unreal scene. The apparitions of figures which belong to other ages; the Venetian mysteries of the domino; the witcheries of beauty half-veiled; the tantalizing salutes from enigmatic figures you cannot recognize; the pretty mockeries whispered into your ear by some ruddy lips whose syllabling seems so strangely familiar and yet defies recognition; the King himself seated above the shifting rout impenetrable as a Sphinx; and the kaleidoscopic changing and flashing of colors as the merry crowd whirls and sways under the musical breath of the orchestra — seem hardly real, hardly possible to belong in any manner to the prosaic life of the century.
Even the few impassioned spectators who remain maskless and motionless form so strange a contrast that they seem like watchers in a haunted palace silently gazing upon a shadowy festival which occurs only once a year in the great hall exactly between the hours of twelve and three. While the most beautiful class of costumes seem ghostly only in that they really belong to past ages, the more grotesque and outlandish sort seem strangely suggestive of a goblin festival.
And above all the charms of the domino! Does it not seem magical that a woman can, by a little bright velvet and shimmering silk, thus make herself into a fairy? And the glorious Night is approaching — this quaint, old-time night, star-jeweled, fantastically robed; and the blue river is bearing us fleets of white boats thronged with strangers who doubtless are dreaming of lights and music, the tepid, perfumed air of Rex's palace, and the motley route of merry ghosts, droll goblins, and sweet fairies, who will dance the dance of Carnival until blue day puts out at once the trembling tapers of the stars and the lights of the great ball. - The Dawn of the Carnival (The New Orleans Item, February 2, 1880), by Lafcadio Hearn
* Carnival is a butterfly of winter whose last real flight of Mardi Gras forever ends his glory. Another season is the season of another butterfly, and the tattered, scattered, fragments of rainbow wings are in turn the record of his day. - The Mistick Krewe: Chronicles of Comus and his Kin, by Perry Young
* The celebration of Mardi Gras is an episode that never becomes stale to the people of the city, however monotonous the description or even the enumeration of its entertainments appears to strangers. At any age it makes a Creole woman young to remember it as she saw it at eighteen; and the description of what it appeared to the eyes of eighteen, would be, perhaps, the only fair description of it, for if Mardi Gras means anything, it means illusion; and unfortunately, when one attains one's majority in the legal world, one ceases to be a citizen of Phantasmagoria.
"There is a tradition that young matrons have recognized their husbands in their masked cavaliers at balls; and that the Romeo incognito of many a debutante has resolved into a brother, or even father; but at least it is not the debutante who makes the discovery. Her cavalier is always beyond her illusion, living in the Elysium of her future, as the cavalier of the matron is always some no less cherished illusion from the Elysium of the past.
As it is the desire of the young girl to be the subject of these illusions, so it is the desire of the young boy to become the object of them. To put on a mask and costume, to change his personality; to figure some day in the complimentary colouring of a prince of India, or of a Grecian god, or even to ape the mincing graces of a dancing girl or woodlawn nymph; to appear to the inamorata, clouded in the unknown, as the ancient gods did to simple shepherdesses; and so to excite her imagination, and perhaps more. A god is only a man when he is in love; and a man, all a god. - New Orleans: The Place and the People (Macmillan, 1913), by Grace King (as quoted in Mardi Gras: New Orleans, by Henri Schindler)
* It [Mardi Gras] is a thing that could hardly exist in the practical North....For the soul of it is the romantic, not the funny and the grotesque. Take away the romantic mysteries, the kings and knights and big-sounding titles, and Mardi Gras would die, down there in the South. - Life on the Mississippi (Harper & Brothers, 1896), by Mark Twain
* Voodoo did not exert a direct musical influence on the Mardi Gras Indians, but it was a cornerstone of the cultural tradition out of which they eventually developed — a living link to the African spirit cults of the Caribbean.
"Large drum-and-dance convocations by slaves surfaced about 1800 on a grassy field behind the French Quarter, now Louis Armstrong Park....The gathering site was called Place Congo—in later years, with English supplanting French as the local language, Congo Square. Drums boomed. Big wooden horns sent out notes. And from the shacks and shanties of the slave quarters came hundreds of men and women to the Sunday gatherings to dance, to make rhythm, to express freedom.
"As a spirit figure, the Indian would never have entered the folk streams of New Orleans music had it not been for Carnival. Congo Square was suppressed about 1835, though some gatherings probably occurred afterward.
"Beginning in the 1880s, the Mardi Gras Indians started the slow rise out of submersion that the mother culture underwent with the disappearance of Congo Square and voodoo. The Indians' chants were not set to drums, but to hand-percussion instruments such as tambourines. They did not worship spirits per se, but through a slow-evolving body of coded lyrics established a tribal hierarchy that praised the Indian nations and celebrated the bravery of rebellion.
The Mardi Gras Indians gave light to the memory of an African past, but in a ritual fashion that embraced the Indian as an adopted spirit figure. It was the highest compliment the African could pay a race of the New World; it stemmed from a common struggle, sociocultural intercourse, a shared vision of freedom — but most of all, from a profoundly African ritual retention. The Indian followed the procession of rebellious slaves, voodoo cultists, and Congo Square dancers in the historical memory. - Up From the Cradle of Jazz: New Orleans Music Since World War II (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1986), by Jason Berry, Jonathan Foose and Tad Jones
* Carnival became ever more necessary for black New Orleans. It filled basic needs increasingly denied the people by allowing new identities to take shape. Creoles and the black bourgeois emulated the white aristocracy with society balls, but a network of social aid and pleasure clubs arose around Carnival.
The costumes were another matter altogether. To whites, they were largely toy disguises, fancy fleetings reflecting one's humor or elan. To the black consciousness, masking often took on a heightened meaning. The mask became a cover, a new identity, a persona eluding the white policeman or soldier; the mask gave ephemeral freedom; the whole organic presence of the costume could scare people, delight them, it could satirize or do any number of things provided the person inside it fulfilled the role to the core of his imagination.
In this way, Carnival became one linear extension of Congo Square. Out of the flickering memory of African spiritualism and percussive ceremony came a procession of spirit figures, an inherited cultural consciousness marching into Carnival. - Up From the Cradle of Jazz: New Orleans Music Since World War II, by Jason Berry, Jonathan Foose and Tad Jones
* The New Orleans 1885 Mardi Gras was extraordinary. On the streets were large numbers of international visitors connected with the [World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial] Exposition, several Central American Indian groups, and some fifty to sixty Plains Indians from the [Buffalo Bill] Wild West Show, including four chiefs, all of whom were likely on the street in native dress. For [locals of African descent, particularly groups who took to masking as Indians,] Mardi Gras translated nicely into a freedom celebration, a day to commemorate their own history and spirit, to be arrogant, to circumvent the hostile authorities, to overturn the established order, and now and then to seek revenge. - Mardi Gras Indians (Pelican Publishing Company, 1994), by Michael P. Smith
* Now everybody in the world has heard about the New Orleans Mardi Gras, but maybe not about the Indians, one of the biggest feats that happened in Mardi Gras. Even at the parades with floats and costumes that cost millions, why, if the folks heard the sign of the Indians: ..................Ungai-ah! ..................Ungai-ha!
— that big parade wouldn't have anybody there: the crowd would flock to see the Indians. When I was a child, I thought they really was Indians. They were paint and blankets and, when they danced, one would get in the ring and throw his head back and downward, stooping over and bending his knees, making a rhythm with his heels and singing—T'ouwais, bas q'ouwais—and the tribe would answer — Ou tendais.
"They would dance and sing and go on just like regular Indians, because they had the idea they wanted to act just like the old Indians did in years gone by and so they lived true to the traditions of the Indian style. They went armed with fictitious spears and tommyhawks and so forth and their main object was to make their enemy bow.
They would send their spy-boys two blocks ahead—I happened to be a spy-boy myself once so I know how this went—and when a spy-boy would meet another spy from an enemy tribe he'd point his finger to the ground and say, 'Bow-wow.' And if they wouldn't bow, the spy-boy would use the Indian call, 'Woo-woo-woo-woo-woo,' that was calling the tribes—and, many a time, in these Indian things, there would be a killing and next day would be somebody in the morgue. - Mister Jelly Roll: The Fortunes of Jelly Roll Morton, New Orleans Creole and "Inventor of Jazz" (Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1950), by Alan Lomax
* Another thing about Mardi Gras when I was a kid was that it was a revenge day. That's why a lot of people didn't come out in the street. If a guy had a misunderstanding with someone in the summer, he'd wait until Carnival day when the street was crowded, and he'd just put on a woman's dress and he'd roll his pants up underneath that. And the only way you can trick him is if you're dressed like a woman too. All you'd hear is people scream and see a man fall with an ice pick in him, and [the assailant would] go into a barroom and leave that dress on the floor. Oh yeah, it used to be real lowdown. - Allison (Tootie) Montana, big chief (now retired) of The Yellow Pocahontas, Offbeat magazine, February 1994
* Whereas revelers used Mardi Gras to satirize prohibitionists and other reformers, early-twentieth-century reformers pointed to New Orleans Carnival as an example of just what needed reforming. In 1908, the Reverend Charles L. Collins of the Kentucky Anti-Saloon League visited New Orleans to see Carnival. Collins proclaimed that 'no city on the continent offers harder problems for the reformer.' Much about the city's easy ways displeased him, including certain aspects of Carnival. 'As to the Mardi Gras festivities proper,' he wrote, 'I am both delighted and shocked beyond measure.' - All on a Mardi Gras Day: Episodes in the History of New Orleans Carnival (Harvard University Press, 1995), by Reid Mitchell
* One of my first memories of the [Mardi Gras Indian] tribes was of a Wild Man from a tribe called the White Eagles coming down the street on horseback, firing double-barrel shotgun loads of colored glass pellets into the air to get everyone's attention and clear the way — which he definitely succeeded in doing. - Under a Hoodoo Moon: The Life of the Night Tripper (St. Martin's Press, 1994), by Dr. John (Mac Rebennack) with Jack Rummel
* One of the gangs was made up of all the whores and pimps from Perdido Street; their parade was called Gangster Molls and Baby Dolls. Everyone in this group dressed as outlandishly as possible: The women wore eye-popping dresses; the ones who looked highest-priced wore ultra-sharp women's suits, but with see-through bras underneath. Others wore slit miniskirts showing lace panties, stiletto heels, and flowery low-cut blouses. The pimps got decked out in acey-deucy Stetsons with cocked brims, jelly-roll-peg zoot suits, one-button roll coats with wide lapels, and zebra-skinned shoes; not infrequently, they'd strut down the street with canes made out of bull dicks.
"They were ridiculous and funny all at the same time. They'd come busting out of their dives during Mardi Gras, their dresses and suits lined in satin and glitter, real sharp-looking and hilarious. They'd march down the greens, that broad strip of grass that separates one side of the street from the other, cutting up, shakin' the bacon and carrying on, and everyone would back off to let them start high-steppin'.
And you had best back off, too, because they took their kicks seriously. They were real rowdy. Cats would brandish switchblades, and whip them out in your face if you got too close. The tribes always drew a big crowd of black and white folks, but this kind of thing seemed normal to me as a kid. Didn't every town have tribes? I thought so. - Under a Hoodoo Moon: The Life of the Night Tripper (St. Martin's Press, 1994), by Dr. John (Mac Rebennack) with Jack Rummel
* There's a thing I've dreamed of all my life, and I'll be damned if it don't look like it's about to come true — to be King of the Zulu's parade. After that, I'll be ready to die. - Louis Armstrong, Time magazine, February 21, 1949
* It's a funny thing how life can be such a drag one minute and a solid sender the next. The day I got out of jail Mardi Gras was being celebrated. It is a great day for all of New Orleans, and particularly for the Zulu Aid Pleasure and Social Club. Every member of the Club masquerades in a costume burlesquing some famous person. The King of the Zulus, also in masquerade costume, rides with six other Zulus on a float giving away coconuts as souvenirs. The members march to the good jumping music of the brass bands while the King on his throne scrapes and bows to the cheering crowds.
"When I ran into this celebration and the good music I forgot all about Sore Dick [the dreaded prison yard captain] and the Parish Prison. Most of the members of the Zulu Club then lived around Liberty and Perdido Streets, but now Mardi Gras has become so famous—people come from all over America to see its parade—that it includes doctors, lawyers and other important people from all over the city. Later on a Lady Zulu Club was organized. It has been my lifelong dream to be the King of the Zulus, as it was the dream of every kid in my neighborhood. - Satchmo: My Life in New Orleans (Prentice-Hall, 1954), by Louis Armstrong (King Zulu 1949)
* On Mardi Gras 1928, a crowd gathered around a woman on Canal Street dancing the Black Bottom. A friend of the dancer's played the ukulele while the crowd 'stamped their feet.' An admiring fat man 'flung her a handful of coins.' If he thought the dancer would appreciate his largess, he was wrong. She gathered the coins together and threw them back at him. 'Anybody can tell you're not used to Carnival!' she cried. 'On Mardi Gras we dance 'cause we want to.' - All on a Mardi Gras Day: Episodes in the History of New Orleans Carnival, by Reid Mitchell
* We was all sittin' around about three o'clock in the morning in my house [trying to decide how to mask for Mardi Gras], when a gal named Althea jumps up and says, 'Let's be ourselves. Let's be Baby Dolls. That's what the pimps always called us.' We decided to call ourselves the Million Dollar Baby Dolls and be red hot....Some of us made our dresses, and some had 'em made. We was all looking sharp. There was thirty of us—the best whores in town. We was all good lookin' and we had money all over us, even in our bloomers, and they didn't have no zippers.....When them Baby Dolls strutted, they strutted. We showed our linen that day, I'm tellin' you. - Baby Doll interview from the late 1930s (as quoted in Mardi Gras: New Orleans, by Henri Schindler)
* As they had for decades, [brass bands] provided the music for the endless cycle of dances and parades in New Orleans, popularizing the startling fusion of influences and celebration that came to be hailed as the only original art form created in America. It would be hyperbole, if not false, to name jazz a child of Carnival; however the joyous license of the music owes more than passing acquaintance to the liberties of Mardi Gras and a population long-accustomed to dancing in the streets. - Mardi Gras: New Orleans, by Henri Schindler
* On Mardi Gras the women of Storyville [New Orleans' red-light district, where prostitution was legal from 1897 to 1917] did not mingle with the maskers but remained in their neighborhood, which now was spreading into the French Quarter, as they took over the houses left by the vanishing Creoles, who once had also possessed Mardi Gras. Now, on that day, Carnival revelers would wander through Storyville in the hours between parades, to gasp at Arlington's 'five-dollar house' with its huge chandeliers and beveled mirrors.
They would drop in at the Countess Willie Piazza's, where the girls were always in lovely Egyptian costumes on Mardi Gras, and at Lulu White's, where there were bedrooms with walls and ceilings composed entirely of mirrors. They could peep through shutters into the cheap cribs, where naked girls sat around awaiting patrons....And they heard the new kind of music being played in Storyville called 'jass,' which was being introduced in other parts of the city but was considered rather indecent. - Mardi Gras (Doubleday, 1948), by Robert Tallent
* I am the oldest, I am the best, and I am the prettiest. - Allison (Tootie) Montana, The New York Times, February 19, 1995
* It is hereby decreed that melancholy be put to route, and joy unconfined seize our subjects, young and old of all genders and degrees...that the spirit of make-believe descend upon the realm and banish from the land the dull and the humdrum and the commonplace of daily existence. - public proclamation, Morgan L. Whitney, King of Carnival (Rex),1967
* The idea of a celebrity leading the Bacchus parade was indeed unique. It went against the grain of 113 years of Carnival tradition. There had never been a celebrity king of a Carnival krewe. Naturally, the idea wasn't met with open arms from the Carnival establishment. The idea was a total departure from the time-honored tradition of selecting a king from the ranks of the krewes.
'These guys are crazy!' [float builder Blaine] Kern told his wife when he arrived home from the first meeting. 'They want to bring some hot-shot to town and make him king of their parade. Imagine. It will never work.' - Silver Jubilee (Krewe of Bacchus' 25th-anniversary book,1993), by Bonnie Warren
* I have trouble explaining to out-of-towners why people here spend $1,000 to wear a mask so no one knows who they are, and then give away things to people they've never met. But I guess it's an opportunity for everybody to play Santa Claus. That's at the heart of it. - Arthur Hardy, publisher of Arthur Hardy's Mardi Gras Guide, explaining why members of Carnival krewes dig into their pockets year after year to ride in parades and throw trinkets, New Orleans Times-Picayune, February 28, 1992
* If you write Mr. Mardi Gras, I get the mail. Do you believe that? Like Santa Claus. - Blaine Kern, float builder and captain of Krewe of Alla, Forbes magazine, October 9, 1995
* Mardi Gras may be best known to the outside world as a public festival, but upper-class New Orleans knew that its real significance lay in the annual reaffirmation of social eminence over merit. The most potent symbol of that creed came on the night of Mardi Gras, when Rex and Comus held their balls in different sections of the municipal auditorium. The evening ended when the mock royalty of the two krewes staged the traditional 'meeting of the courts' shortly before midnight. It was not for nothing that the bare-faced Rex, chosen in part for his civic contributions, had to traipse over and pay his respects to the mysterious Comus. - Lords of Misrule: Mardi Gras and the Politics of Race in New Orleans (University Press of Mississippi, 1997), by James Gill
* The current structure of Mardi Gras, which blacks refer to as the 'white parade season,' dates from the latter half of the nineteenth century. After the consolidation of the Anglo-American establishment, the 'official' Mardi Gras became an event that primarily perpetuated the interests of white high society. The common people's carnival—with its subversion of the dominant order, wild dancing, and festive transgressions (iconoclastic celebration of freedom through cross dressing, 'obscenity,' and other behavior offensive to genteel Americans—was relegated to the back streets and ignored by the press. - Mardi Gras Indians, by Michael P. Smith
* A few months before the 1992 Carnival, a black city-council member named Dorothy Mae Taylor introduced an ordinance that would prohibit a parade permit to any group that discriminated on the basis of race or religion or gender.... In New Orleans, it had always been assumed that people would celebrate Carnival in their own way, whether it was by riding in the parade of an all-woman krewe or holding a ball-gown contest for men in drag. There was a widespread feeling that applying human-relations-commission rules to Carnival might not only rob it of its oldest parades but sink it altogether. - "New Orleans Unmasked" (The New Yorker magazine, February 2, 1998), by Calvin Trillin
* Momus, Son of Night, God of Mockery and Ridicule, regretfully and respectfully informs his friends, supporters and his public that he will not parade the streets of New Orleans on the Thursday evening before Shrove Tuesday, 1992, as he has customarily since 1872. - Momus's parade cancellation announcement, issued in response to the City Council's anti-discrimination ordinance
* The rise and gradual decline of the old-line krewes pretty well mirrored the fortunes of New Orleans itself. Comus was born as an unparalleled spectacle in a vibrant city that was the commercial queen of the South. When he disappeared from the streets [as a result of the anti-discrimination ordinance], New Orleans had become a faded dowager trying desperately to regain her lost prestige while the taste of Carnival paradegoers had switched to the razzle-dazzle offered by a welter of upstart krewes. - Lords of Misrule: Mardi Gras and the Politics of Race in New Orleans, by James Gill
* Mardi Gras is a controlled riot. It's a million people walking out on the street, drinkin'. Ten days of everybody coming out here gettin' drunk and havin' fun. Ten days of us working 16, 18 hours a day.... Basically everybody's just having a good time, tryin' to enjoy themselves, and they don't mean any harm to anybody else. It's just the world's largest free party, and people like everything free.
"People come out here on Mardi Gras day in $800 suits. Just for a doubloon worth maybe 3 cents, they'll sort of dive on the ground and rip up an $800 suit. Grandmas with walking canes you'll see diving, pushing people out the way to get a pair of beads. People just go totally berserk when they come here—loose all their their inhibitions, they forget everything they ever been taught in their life. - Sgt. Billy Roth, New Orleans Police Department, Cops (March 20, 1996)
* As the celebration in the [French] Quarter has come more and more to resemble spring vacation in a Florida beach town that has no police force, exhibitionism has become part of the Carnival-bead transaction, and the most widely heard cry is no longer 'Throw me something, Mister' but 'Show us your tits.' - "New Orleans Unmasked," by Calvin Trillin
* As cameras for MTV, true-life crime shows and tabloid news programs roll in the French Quarter, the drunken partying has grown so extreme—flashes of nudity have given way to the actual performance of oral sex acts on Bourbon Street—that it is the drunkenness and obscenity itself that threatens to become Carnival's theme....That increasingly dangerous reputation of anything goes is scaring away more middle-class adult visitors, the kind of people who actually spend money, and attracting young people who only want to frolic in a drunken haze, traditionalists say. - "Merrymaking is Clashing with Tradition in Mardi Gras Tableaux" (The New York Times, February 23, 1998), by Rick Bragg
...When out of town, you stop and ask someone where there is a drive-thru daiquiri place, and they look at you like you have three heads.
...The crawdad mounds in your front yard have overtaken the grass.
...You greet people with "Howyamomma'an'em?" and hear back "Dey fine!"
...Every so often, you have waterfront property. (flooding)
...You learned to drive a boat before you could drive a car.
...You know the meaning of a "Delcambre Reeboks." (That would be a pair of all white fishing boots)
...You offer somebody a "coke" and then ask them what kind: Coca-Cola, Dr. Pepper, Pepsi, 7Up?
...You can name all of your 3rd cousins.
...You can plan your wedding around hunting season & LSU football.
...Your burial plot is six feet over rather than six feet under. (some areas of Louisiana are at sea level so they bury the dead in stone vaults like you see in New Orleans cemeteries)
...When you refer to a geographical location "way up North", you are referring to places like Shreveport, Little Rock or Memphis, "where it gets real cold"! (those cold places: Shreveport, Louisiana - Little Rock, Arkansas - Memphis, Tennessee)
...You're not afraid when someone wants to "ax you something." (ax = ask)
...You don't worry when you see ships riding higher in the river than the top of your house.
....The waitress at your local sandwich shop tells you a fried oyster po-boy "dressed" is healthier than a Caesar salad.
...You know the definition of "dressed." (mayo, pickles, mustard)
...The smell of a crawfish boil turns you on more than HBO.
...You don't realize until high school what a "county" is. (in Louisiana a county is called a parish)
...You can eat Popeye's, Haydel's and Zapp's for lunch and wash it down with Barq's and several Abitas, without losing it all on your stoop. (Popeye's: fried chicken, Haydel's: bakery in New Orleans famous for making Mardi Gras King Cakes, Zapp's: potato chips, Barq's: root beer, Abita: beer.)
...You have a ditch on at least one side of your property. (drainage or sewer ditch for rain water run off to avoid flooding)
...You prefer skiing on the bayou. (water skiing)
...You assume everyone has mosquito swarms in their backyard.
...You like your rice and politics dirty. (dirty rice has ground meat in it)
...You pronounce the largest city in the state as "Newawlins." (New Orleans)
...You know an old person that can "treat" you for warts. (traiteuse: French Native American shaman)
...You know those big roaches can fly, but you're able to sleep at night anyway.
...You can't think of anybody that can cook better than your momma.
...You know when it's appropriate to use "Tony Chachere's." (Cajun seasoning)
...When you're in Baton Rouge you know the difference between the old bridge & the new bridge. (over the Mississippi River)
...Your last name isn't pronounced the way it's spelled.
...You have spent a summer afternoon on the Lake Pontchartrain seawall catching blue crabs.
*** THANKS for visiting, come back often, feel free to leave comments because I enjoy hearing from you, visit New Orleans Mardi Gras at least once in your life - put it on your Bucket List, a big shout out to current subscribers - and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email!
From Denny: Two recipes are easy to make and real crowd pleasers for the Marti Gras season of parades when you invite a lot of people over to your house to view the parades. Even if you live in a part of the country that does not celebrate Marti Gras the way we do you will still find these recipes a lot of fun. You could serve these even at a family reunion gathering or at Easter. The recipes? They are a red beans and rice dish and King Cake from a local food writer in Baton Rouge.
Do you know anything about the history of the King Cake? General opinion dates it back to the Middle Ages in Europe. It was made to honor the Magi, the famous three kings (who may have also been astronomers) who came to visit Jesus Christ as a child. In the 1700's when the Acadian French were chased out of Canada all the way down into the malaria infested swamps of Louisiana they still clung to many traditions. The King Cake custom was one of them, celebrated on the Feast of the Epiphany.
In 1800's Louisiana was when the Marti Gras Krewes (clubs) began forming in New Orleans. When was the official kickoff date of the Carnival season? You guessed it: the Feast of the Epiphany and the King Cake became associated with the Carnival. We always top the cake with colored sugars in three colors: purple, green and gold. The colors represent special elements: purple for justice, green for faith and gold represents power.
There are many pastry and grocery shops from New Orleans to Baton Rouge to Lafayette that make dozens of varieties of King Cake like stuffed with blueberries and cream cheese, chocolate fudge, boston creme and an endless variety of creative ideas that all taste awesome.
Why make you own? Awww, come on, why not? Besides, if you are like me there are times when you have lived away from an area that makes these and it's wonderful to make your own. Baking sweetened bread is so easy like making the old-fashioned Swedish cinnamon breakfast rings. You can involve the kids in this recipe too. There is something so rewarding about baking your own bread and even more so when it is for a holiday.
This recipe for a cinnamon version is easy and makes for a very light and moist King Cake. It does take some time, like any bread recipe from scratch. So make sure you allow time for the dough to rise for the full 60 to 90 minutes recommended - or at least until it's doubled its size. It's the doubling that is the key to a light and moist dough that can hold that fragrant cinnamon filling.
*** Feel free to comment as I enjoy hearing from all of you!
Homemade King Cake
From: Tracey Koch
Serves: 12
Dough Ingredients:
1 (3/4-oz.) packet or a little more than 1 tsp. rapid-rise yeast (Be sure to check the expiration date before using.) 1 tbl. sugar 1 cup warm water (about 105 degrees) 3-1/4 cups all-purpose flour, divided 1/4 cup sugar 1/2 tsp. salt 2 eggs (slightly beaten) 4 tbls. butter (melted and cooled) Purple, Green and Gold Sugar Toppings (see recipe)
Filling Ingredients:
1/3 cup sugar 2 tbls. cinnamon 2 tbls. softened butter
Directions:
1. To make the dough: In a 2-cup measuring cup dissolve the yeast and 1 tablespoon sugar in the warm water and allow it to sit for 3 to 4 minutes or until it becomes frothy.
2. In a large mixing bowl, sift together 3 cups of the flour, 1/4 cup sugar and salt.
3. Make a well in the sifted flour and add in the frothy yeast mixture along with the eggs and cooled melted butter. Using a wooden spoon, combine ingredients until all is incorporated and a sticky ball is formed.
4. Sprinkle the dough with a tablespoon of flour, and sprinkle an additional tablespoon of flour onto a work surface. Knead the dough for 1 minute and then return it to the mixing bowl to rise.
5. Cover the bowl with a dish towel and place in a warm, draft-free place. Allow the dough to rise for 1 to 1-1/2 hours or until doubled in bulk.
6. Cut out a piece of parchment paper to measure 15x10 inches and sprinkle with a little of the remaining flour. Roll dough out on the parchment paper to about 1/2-inch thick and into a 14x9-inch rectangle.
7. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
8. For filling, combine sugar and cinnamon and set aside.
9. Spread softened butter onto the rolled-out dough and then sprinkle the top with the cinnamon-sugar.
10. Roll the dough up lengthwise to form a log, sealing the seam to keep the cinnamon-sugar inside. Bring both ends of the log together to form a ring. Press the ends together to connect them.
11. Line a baking sheet with a fresh sheet of parchment paper. Place the ring of dough on the parchment paper.
12. Stretch the dough to form an oval shape. Pulling the dough ring will also help to make the king cake even all the way around and bake more evenly.
13. Sprinkle the ring with purple, green and gold sugar and bake 20 to 30 minutes or until puffed and golden.
Purple, Green and Gold Sugar Toppings
Ingredients:
6 tbls. sugar
Yellow, green, red and blue food coloring
Directions:
1. Divide the sugar among three bowls, placing 2 tablespoons in each bowl.
2. To make the gold sugar use 2 to 4 drops of the yellow food coloring. Use the back of a teaspoon to mash the food coloring into the sugar. Repeat the steps, using green food coloring, to make green sugar.
3. For the purple, use 3 drops of blue food coloring followed by 2 to 3 drops of red. Mash the colors into the sugar until you reach the desired hue.
Kitchen helpers: This is a great way to introduce your children to working with yeast dough. It is easy to make and doesn’t require any electrical appliances. Youngsters will also enjoy coloring the sugar.
This is one of the simplest red bean recipes and it derives most of its flavor from the turkey tasso. If you are unable to acquire tasso, whether pork or turkey, just substitute your favorite sausage or prosciutto. This simple savory recipe would appeal to a wide range of people.
You can make this easily in a slow cooker. It's also topped with a tapenade to give the plain red beans more interest and kicked up flavor. Any time you add fresh vegetables to a slow cooked dish it gives it another dimension.
You can always place Tabasco sauce and Cajun seasoning on the side for people who want to kick up their bowls with more spice. :) Many times for families with small children we cook a less spicy version and then offer spices on the side for the adults to add to their personal taste.
Three-Step Red Beans
From: Tracey Koch
Serves: 6
Ingredients:
1 (1-lb.) pkg. dried red kidney beans 1 tbl. olive oil 1 lb. smoked turkey tasso (cut into chunks) 1 cup chopped onions 2 tbls. minced garlic 4 cups low-sodium chicken broth Salt and pepper, to taste
Directions:
1. Put beans in large pot and add in enough cold water to cover them. Bring beans to a rolling boil; allow beans to boil for 15 to 20 minutes, remove from heat and drain well.
Note: You can do Step 3 in a slow cooker. Put all prepared ingredients in slow cooker and set on High. Once beans begin to boil (takes about 1-1/2 hours), reduce heat to Low and cook for an additional 2 to 3 hours.
Kitchen helpers: Kids can be a big help in chopping the onions and tasso. They can also help watch the beans as they cook.
Marinated Veggie Tapenade
From: Tracey Koch
Serves: 6
Ingredients:
1 English cucumber (seeded and diced) 1 cup chopped grape tomatoes 1 cup chopped kalamata olives 1 cup seeded and chopped banana peppers 1/4 cup chopped red onions 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar 1/2 cup olive oil Salt and black pepper, to taste
Directions:
1. In a large mixing bowl, combine the cucumbers, tomatoes, olives, peppers and red onions.
2. In a measuring cup, whisk together the vinegar and oil and pour the mixture over the vegetables.
3. Season with a little salt and pepper and cover.
4. Chill the marinated vegetables for an hour or so before serving.
Kitchen helpers: Kids will enjoy mixing up this colorful vegetable medley. It is great tossed in a salad, but the cool, crisp and tangy tapenade will add another dimension of taste and texture to red beans. This is a great way to sneak more vegetables into the meal. It is also a great way to let your kids experience a variety of textures using flavors that are very family friendly.
*** ALSO: For more recipes like this, please visit Comfort Food From Louisiana! Mardi Gras recipes are wonderful all year long! :)
*** THANKS for visiting, come back often, feel free to leave comments, a big shout out to current subscribers - and if you are new to this blog, please subscribe in a reader or by email!
