Our annual Best of New Orleans® 2006 readers' survey shows that locals haven't lost their touch -- or their taste -- for choosing the Crescent City's finest.
Now more than ever, we need cause to celebrate the many reasons we're all proud to call New Orleans home. In the following pages, you tell us your reasons in our annual Best of New Orleans® readers' survey.
We counted your votes, and relay here what you feel is the best, from selections in food, art and music -- the hallmarks of local culture -- to politicians both brave and bumbling, to members of the media who proved this year how much the Fourth Estate means, to the range of goods and services we need day to day on our road to recovery. We also took your votes on the best ways Congressman William Jefferson should hide his stash of cash, along with your picks for the best quotes from Katrina coverage, and expanded them into stories.
Gambit Weekly writers also created some bests of their own, capturing the views of two jazz heads on a Louis Armstrong voyage as well as ways to spend that fickle, federally funded time off some refer to as the "K-cation."
In the interest of staying current, we feature as winners only those that are back in business, despite many voting for -- and longing for -- beloved local institutions that are either temporarily closed or, sadly, gone for good. We wish them -- and everyone displaced -- a speedy recovery and return.
In the meantime, we wish everyone the Best of New Orleans®!
On the Cover: This year's Best of New
Orleans® cover features journalist and
anchor Garland Robinette, who during and since
Katrina has provided New Orleans residents with
a voice -- one of reason -- valuable information,
and lively debates on important issues, all
broadcast across the country on the 50,000-watt
Clear Channel radio station WWL. Gambit Weekly
readers voted Robinette Best Local Radio Talk
Show Host and his "Think Tank" program the
Best Local Radio Show in this year's poll.
