Fat Thursday: Celebrate Mardi Gras at Nola

Maybe you know that “The Beast of the Bayou” is a nickname for the Saints but did you know Louisiana has no counties and only parishes? Or that Louis Armstrong signed his letters with “Red beans and ricely yours?” If those facts don’t ring a bell, you’ll want to brush up on your New Orleans trivia if you want to catch Nola’s Mardi Gras coconut this year. Confused? Just keep reading.

ROUND 1: FOOD & DRINK
Tuck into a buffet of all the Creole classics. There’ll be Monday’s meal of red beans and rice, plus Cajun-spiced jambalaya, gumbo and more. Get there at 3pm for an early happy hour and knock back some of the city’s most iconic drinks, such as a Hurricane or Sazerac.

ROUND 2: MUSIC
Beijing bluegrass outfit Randy Abel Stable will take the stage after the King of Nola has been crowned with a coconut (see above). They’re no second line but they may mix things up with some familiar Louisiana sounds. You may be able to convince the band to offer up some Dixieland – the city’s earliest form of jazz – but don’t count on many Sousa marches coming from the banjo.

ROUND 3: QUIZ
Time to call your friends from New Orleans and the South. Teams will match wits over NOLA trivia, facts and obscure tidbits (a local television commercial was the basis of one question last year). The top two teams in each of the four rounds will win prizes or drinks. But the big prize – the Nola coconut worth a 15 percent discount at the restaurant throughout 2013 – will be given to the winner in an individual round at the end.

*None of these rounds refer to the actual quiz, and the chance of any of this trivia appearing in the quiz is pure luck.

Mardi Gras at Nola takes place on Feb 7.

This article originally appeared on page 42 in the February issue of the Beijinger.