New Orleans Cocktail Tour: A History of Mixed Drinks

New Orleans is a city synonymous with partying and having a good time. It’s also historically significant as the birthplace of the cocktail.

And I’m not just talking about the sugar-filled, rum-based Hurricane born out of Pat O’Brien’s Bar.

I’m referring to the concept of the cocktail as an entirely new category of mixed drinks.

Surprised? I was too!

It’s just one of the many stories you’ll hear on a cocktail history tour with Doctor Gumbo.

If you’re looking to add context to your drink consumption or are traveling solo and prefer some company for a bar crawl, this tour is for you. 

NOLA Cocktail History Bar Crawl

1. Tiki Tolteca

The tour began at Tiki Tolteca (301 N. Peters St), a Latin American tiki bar that opened in the 1980s and bills itself as the first tiki bar in New Orleans. 

Here, I met the others in our tour group, along with Ben, our larger-than-life tour guide. 

Ben acknowledged that there was no particular reason the first bar of the tour was Tiki…