Author: Emily Gautreaux

The Best Tours to Take in Louisiana Food

We all know by now that Louisiana food and cuisine is some of the best and most authentic in the South. Backed by several generations-old recipes, it’s hard to go wrong when dining in Louisiana.

One of the best ways to get a true taste of Louisiana and everything they have to offer is through food tours. Thanks to Louisiana Travel, here is an extensive list of the best food tours you can take all throughout Louisiana.

Lafayette, Louisiana

Also known as the “Tastiest Town in the South” according to Southern Living, Lafayette is the unofficial capital of Louisiana’s Cajun heartland.

With everything from local mom and pop shops to high-end dining and everything in between, you’ll never run out of options – which can also be a bad thing. Being overwhelmed with choices and having a limited amount of time to try them all can be frustrating.

Enter: Cajun Food Tours

On this deliciously exciting tour, company founder Marie Ducote-Comeaux will take you on an approximately three-hour tour of at least five locally-owned restaurants. You can choose from four different tour options: the Original Cajun Food Tour, the Breaux Bridge Food Tour, the All-Day Cajun Experience, or the Around the World in Acadiana Taste Tour.

On the tour, you’ll hear stories about the history and culture inhibiting Acadiana (which is another name for Cajun Country) while eating a variety of Louisiana specialties like gumbo, étouffée, cracklins, and boudin.

Baton Rouge

The actual capital of Louisiana, Baton Rouge is known for its eclectic characters, rich history, and amazing Cajun cooking.

Baton Rouge Food Tours invites you to the opportunity to try all of the sweet, savory, and unique flavors they have to offer. A two and a half hour C’est Si Bon walking taste tour takes you through a stroll of downtown Baton Rouge and to at least five restaurants for sampling true Cajun cooking, where you’ll also learn about history, music, art, and so much more.

Avery Island

Avery Island is infamous for being the origin of the famous pepper sauce known as TABASCO. To learn more about the story of TABASCO and the McIlhenny family, click here.

Naturally, the best food tour in Avery Island is the TABASCO Food Tour. Not only will you learn about the company, but you’ll also have the chance to taste dishes that pair perfectly with the sauce. You’ll visit an array of restaurants, like Bon Creole Seafoodand R&M’s Boiling Point.

New Orleans

The best-known hotspot for tourists in Louisiana, leave it up to the perfect guide to enchant you on the fascinating history of New Orleans’ famous ghosts and even more famous (and delicious) cuisines.

Here, you have your choice from three top-rated food tours; Destination Kitchen, Tastebud Tours, and New Orleans Culinary History Tours.

Destination Kitchen’s expert guides will take you on tasting tours of the French Quarter, the Garden District, and Uptown.

Tastebud Tours will guide you to the best known French Quarter restaurants and have five themed tours ranging from fresh seafood, sunset tours, and even a haunted restaurant tour.

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Top Christmas Recipes from Around the World

The holidays are a time of feasting and laughter, with new and old Christmas traditions to be done. Each family has their own “special” traditions, from matching Christmas Eve pajamas to making generations-old Christmas recipes.

With Christmas at our heels, we thought it would be a great idea to explore Christmas recipes from around the world. Who knows, maybe you’ll find a new recipe you love that will become a special tradition for yourfamily!

Saveur put together an extensive list of how the world eats Christmas, and here are a few of our favorites!

Reserved especially for special occasions (like weddings or the holidays), these polish bow tie fritters, also known as angel wings, are baked to crispy perfection with a doughy inside, then sugar-dusted (hence the angel wings).

This Icelandic dish is a combination of ptarmigan, or wild grouse, and a sweet-tart sauce commonly made with thyme and blueberries. To get the full Icelandic Christmas dinner effect, pair with cooked cabbage and potatoes.

As is true Filipino fashion, this slow-roasted pork belly is the perfect stand-in for the main entree of your holiday feast. Topped with a chicken or pork liver sauce, Chef Tade states it tastes like “liverwurst mixed with sweet and sour sauce.”

This Danish dish offers a bite of something sweet and savory with sweet red apples roasted with onions, then caramelized in bacon fat, and served up under a blanket of smoked belly bacon. Make sure to use apples like the Braeburn or Gala to make sure they hold up and keep their shape.

Crab for Christmas? Yes, please! Also known as chupe de centolla, this Chilean dish is a favorite. Comparable to South American chupe, which is made with milk-soaked bread and an assortment of shrimp, scallops, shellfish, meats, and cheeses, this dish shifts it’s focus to the massive local king crabs.

A Puerto Rican spin on classic chicken noodle soup, this hearty recipe is filled with starchy vegetables and shredded chicken.

Made from battered and fried veal scaloppine and topped with anchovies and fresh-grated horseradish, this Austrian schnitzel is the perfect brunch after a long night with family and friends.

You can find this dish gracing the tables of families from Goa, a small state on the western coast of India. This recipe incorporates fresh seafood, most often shrimp, and coconut curry. Sounds like the perfect Christmas Eve dinner to us.

An American classic, this dish is often labored over the day leading up to Christmas dinner and used as the centerpiece for an entire spread of delicious recipes. If you aren’t a fan of turkey, ham or chicken can be used instead.

The ultimate Hungarian comfort food, this dish is prepared by preparing a thick cornmeal and smoked ham filling, rolling it in blanched cabbage leaves, and smothering it in a paprika-spiced tomato sauce.

For more delicious recipes, click here.

The Best Places To Travel To In 2020

A new year is quickly approaching and with that comes new year’s resolutions. Whether your resolution is to travel more, stress less, or spend quality time with friends and family, this list is for you! Travel + Leisure released its top places to travel in 2020 and they included a little something for everyone. Here are our favorites!

Austria

Now a favorite spot for the younger crowd, Austria is in the midst of reinventing itself. Enjoy their cutting-edge arts institutions and then head to the Andaz Vienna Am Belvedere, a $240 million development project that surrounds the city’s central train station. You can also tour other venues like Belvedere 21, the Freud Museum, Musikverein, and end up at the Salzburg Festival. – John Wray

Travel to Barbados

Visitors to Barbados in 2020 will be able to participate in a 52-week festival called “We Gatherin”, which will launch in January and travel to all 11 parishes before ending in a country-wide bash in December. You can expect lively street parades, traditional dishes, live soca music, and plenty of festivals within the festival. If you want to miss out on the action but still vacation on the island, head to Cobblers Cove.– Nora Walsh

Big Island, Hawaii

The island’s biggest resort opening in years is set to debut in January 2020 — a reimagining of Mauna Lani by Auberge Resorts, the first Hawaiian venture by the Bay Area-based luxury hotel brand. The resort will have a redesigned spa that incorporates Hawaiian botanicals and Canoe House, a beachfront restaurant.  – John Wogan

Botswana

Take your pick from a slew of new safari lodges. The Okavango Delta just saw the opening of Natural Selection’s Tuludi, a treehouse-inspired camp with seven tented suites connected by elevated boardwalks, and come June, the solar-powered Xigera Safari Lodge will debut in the delta’s Moremi Game Reserve. You can also check out a six-tent mobile camp called Linyanti Expeditions or the Great Plains Selinda Camp.– Madeline Bilis

Brisbane, Australia

Family-friendly Waterline Park courts outdoor enthusiasts with a climbing wall and other sporting equipment; Mangrove Walk focuses on indigenous culture and local wildlife, with educational signposts stationed throughout the quarter-mile path; and the initial section of a rehabilitated Bicentennial Bikeway features wider lanes, better sight lines, and improved traffic flow. Choose from your choice of high-profile hotels like the Calile, Ovili Inchcolm, the Fantauzzo, or the Ritz-Carlton or Rosewood in Queen’s Wharf. – Sarah Bruning

Travel to Costa Rica

Several just-opened eco-retreats are offering more ways to unwind in Costa Rica. Perhaps the most-anticipated is Nayara Tented Camp, a safari-style retreat inside a sloth sanctuary. Then there’s Kasiiya Papagayo, which opened as an adventure-focused getaway; walkie-talkies and headlamps are distributed at check-in. Farther south isKinkára Luxury Retreat, built on the slopes of the Talamanca mountain range. – Madeline Bilis

Dominica

This 290-square-mile teardrop is an outdoorsy traveler’s oasis, claiming 365 rivers, 300 miles of hiking trails, a dozen waterfalls, and the world’s second-largest hot spring. You’ll have your pick from the Cabrits Resort & Spa Kempinksi, wellness resort Jungle Bay,Secret Bay, and Anichi Resort & Spa. – Sarah Greaves-Gabbadon

Dubai

Expo 2020 Dubai, the first World Expo to be held in the Middle East, is set to change the face of a city whose face is always, already, constantly in flux. About halfway between Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the 1,000-acre “District 2020” will eventually have multiple parks, a dedicated metro station, and more than 200 restaurants and food venues. —Hannah Walhout

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The Best Holiday Lights in the US

Regardless of your location in the States, watching the twinkle of the Christmas lights is sure to spark joy and get you in the holiday mood. With a long and dated history, Christmas lights have become a symbol for an exciting and giving season.

Finding the best Christmas lights display within driving distance is a fun activity for the whole family, where you can watch the flickering of green and red dance to the best Christmas music. A few weeks ago, Travel + Leisure shared an updated list of the best Christmas lights in every state. Here are a few of our favorites!

Arkansas

Originally, the best Christmas Lights display belonged to the Osbourne Family Spectacle. Now that Disney laid their claim and moved it to Florida, you can get your Christmas fix at the Arkansas State Capitol Building.

Connecticut

Head to Hartford for the Holiday Light Fantasia, a drive-through animated Christmas display with larger-than-life scenes for Christmas, Hanukkah, and New Year’s Eve. Make sure to look out for Flurry, a puppy wearing a Santa hat, hidden amongst all the lights.

Georgia

Whether you want a self-guided walking tour or a Christmas-themed getaway, Barnsley Resort in Adairsville is the place to go. Here, you’ll find millions of bulbs illuminating the manor house ruins.

Hawaii

Are you ready for a multi-house, synchronized holiday experience? Then head to the Waikele neighborhoodto see the grand Christmas lights show lead by the Yoshida family. There are shows daily from 7pm to 9:30pm, and the lights are usually up till early January.

Iowa

Make sure to swing by the Jolly Holiday Lights, a 2.5 mile ride through over 100 light displays. All proceeds from the Jolly Holiday Lights are donated to Make-A-Wish Iowa.

Louisiana

Head to New Orlean’s to see the lights at Celebration in the Oaks. With over 165,000 visitors each year, there are hundreds of thousands of lights dancing throughout the oak groves in City Park. You’ll also have the opportunity to ride on the antique wooden carousel, so make sure you get a great look at “The Cajun Night Before Christmas” display.

Maryland

Prefer your Christmas celebrations to be on the extreme side? Check out Baltimore’s 34th Street. Each house on the block dresses up in light displays ranging from candy canes and Christmas trees to Mr. Boh, Poe the Raven, and Chesapeake crabs.

New York

Nope, we aren’t talking Rockefeller Center. The hidden Christmas lights gem is actually in Dyker Heights, where homeowners in this Brooklyn neighborhood have an unspoken competition to see who has the best over-the-top lights, professionally crafted displays, and inflatable lawn ornaments.

Ohio

For a unique experience, head to Ohio’s famousClifton Mill, where 3.5 million lights decorate  the building, the gorge, and nearby trees. Make sure to take in the 100-foot “waterfall” of lights, and be good, because there’s a good chance Santa is checking his list in Santa’s Workshop.

Tennessee

The Opryland Hotel in Nashville morphs into a literal winter wonderland over the holidays. You’ll see over 2 million twinkling lights, acres of holiday decor, and indoor winter wonderland (made with over 2 million pounds of ice), and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: The Musical.

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Two Parishes to Pilot Debt-Free Opportunities for Students

Northwest and Southwest Louisiana school systems, colleges, and employers have collaborated to test alternative graduation models that allow certain students to take part in a fifth year of high school to earn career skills and credits towards a college degree, reports Louisiana Believes. The program aims to provide debt-free opportunities for students.

The Extension Academies are two new pilot programs and were approved recently by the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Louisiana Board of Regents at a joint meeting. Each pilot will last three years and launch in the 2020-2021 school year. It will serve up to 25 students in the first year with hopes to offer debt-free options for students.

State Superintendent John White said about the pilot programs: “The question we used to ask ourselves was how high we could raise our graduation rate and how low we could push our dropout rate. Now we are compelled to ask what happens to our graduates and whether they risk dropping out of work and the economy even after they graduate from high school. If this is the case, even with a small number of students, we must rise to meet this new dropout challenge.”

Kim Hunter Reed, the Commissioner of Higher Education, said “We applaud our partners in education and business for joining together to embrace the opportunity to positively impact these young people at a critical point in their lives. We also look forward to monitoring the results of these pilots as we work collectively to increase talent development in our state.”

The pilot programs are specifically designed to aid students who have are set to graduate from high school but have yet to earn Taylor Opportunity Program for Students scholarships to pay for their post-secondary goals or to acquire post-secondary credentials. For example, in 2018 about 15,000 students who graduated with a TOPS University Diploma pathway weren’t eligible for TOPS scholarships to pay for higher education, and about 3,200 students who graduated on a Jump Start TOPS Tech Career Diploma weren’t on the correct path to earning an advanced industry-based credential so they weren’t eligible for TOPS Tech scholarships.

Through their applications, the regional partners outlined how they plan to provide eligible students a debt-free one-year opportunity to achieve significant progress toward a state-recognized associate’s degree through accelerated dual enrollment college experiences, complete a registered pre-apprenticeship, or earn an advanced industry-based credential. They also detailed types of support and transitional coaching that will be available to participating students as they finish their high school diploma.

The Southwest Consortium is the Extension Academy pilot in the southwest region of Louisiana will bring together nine public schools in Calcasieu Parish and industry partners to supply students opportunities to develop and strengthen skills and training in automotive, HVAC, pharmacy, medicine, and cyber programs.

Director of Career and Technical Education and College Programs for the Calcasieu Parish School Board, Tony McCardle said, “Students will experience a deeper dive into courses and develop richer skill sets that will prepare them to propel beyond the high school experience. Early indications are showing that students are excited about this opportunity, as it will assist them in being fiercely competitive in the high-wage and high-demand workforce.  We are proud to be able to offer this opportunity to our students and community.”

The Northwest Consortium is the Extension Academy pilot in the northwest region of Louisiana will bring together 12 public schools in Caddo Parish and industry partners to supply students opportunities to develop and strengthen skills and training in automotive, HVAC, pharmacy, medicine, and cyber programs.

“What an exciting opportunity for graduating students in the Northwest Consortium that don’t meet TOPS or TOPS Tech to have an additional year toward an associate’s degree or a statewide industry-based credential (IBC). With no tuition cost to the student, eligible participants in the Extension Academy will be full-time students on either Bossier Parish Community College’s campus or Ayers Career College campus. Eligible students also have an opportunity to complete a statewide IBC at Caddo’s Career and Technology Center. This effort will not only enhance what we are able to provide students to assist them as they pursue their desired programs, but also support the work of our school system to ensure all students are prepared for the next step.” said Victor Mainiero, Executive Director of High School Performance for Caddo Parish Public Schools.

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The Best Christmas Getaways in Louisiana

Something about Christmas makes everything more magical, and Louisiana is no exception. The arrival of the holidays transforms Louisiana into bustling towns and communities filled with Christmas cheer. You can travel through Louisiana and see the Festival of Light displays and the Holiday Light Safaris. Thanks to Tripping, here’s a list of seven Christmas getaways in Louisiana you and the whole family will enjoy!

Pineville

This quaint town is packed with Christmas-themed activities during the holiday season. Enjoy the annual Christmas Parade at the beginning of December that features homemade floats and ends with Santa and Mrs. Claus. Afterward, you can tour the historic homes decked out for the holidays and view the annual Holiday Light Safariin neighboring Alexandria.

Shreveport

On the first Saturday of every December, the town of Shreveport lights up their Earl Williamson Park with the Christmas on Caddo Fireworks Festival. You can spend the evening trying out true southern cuisine made by local vendors, listen to live music, and browse arts and crafts from the crafts vendors. If you’re visiting in November, check out the Louisiana Boardwalk’s Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony on the banks of Red River.

Lafayette

The Noel Acadien au Village is a must-see during the holidays in Lafayette. The colorful light displayfeatures half-a-million lights, including the fully lit Chapel, new animations, lighted holiday displays, live entertainment, carnival rides, local cuisine, photos with Santa, holiday shopping in the Christmas Store and much more! Make sure to plan to see the Cajun and Creole Christmas Event, which has live music performances!

Opelousas

This historic town celebrates the holidays with the Lighting of the Village, where residents decorate their homes, businesses dress up their windows with holiday-themed displays, and city center comes to life with various holiday displays. This event is family-friendly and offers a variety of activities for children including a petting zoo, choir music, an obstacle course fun jump, a cupcake decorating station, and an ornament making station. Kids will be able to take their ornaments home and enjoy their specially made cupcakes.

This is one Christmas getaway you do not want to miss. Christmas celebrations in Natchitoches start in late November with the fireworks display on Cane River Lake. Next, you can participate in the Natchitoches Christmas Festival Parade with live music, holiday-themed floats, and a light show (and don’t forget Santa!) that happens on the first Saturday of December. Don’t forget to see the annual Christmas Festival of Lights, which brings visitors from all over, to see the 300,000 lights strung along the riverbank throughout November and December.

You can’t go wrong visiting New Orleans at any point during the year, but visiting during the holidaysbrings a whole new experience. Start out with a trip to the Celebration in the Oaks, where City Park becomes a winter wonderland of lights. Head to the French Quarter to listen to the Christmas concerts at the St. Louis Cathedral, then peruse the historic homes that are decorated for the holidays.

Located in the heart of Louisiana’s southern charm, Baton Rouge is transformed into Christmas central during the holidays, making it a Christmas getaway you should consider.  Head to the city’s center to see the lighting of their Christmas tree or cheer on the homemade floats and bands marching down the street during their Christmas parade. Make sure to check out the ZooLights Festival, where light displays take over the Brec’s Baton Rouge Zoo. If you still want to see more, visit the Festival of Lights exhibit at the Louisana Art and Science Museum.

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