Six

On the sixth day of Christmas, we stopped at

K&B's, for a

Six Pack o' Dixie.

FRIED onion rings.

beFOUR you drive me nuts.

three french breads

Tujague's recipe

for the crawfish they caught in Arabi.

Katz & Besthoff Drug Stores were local new Orleans chain that expanded into Southeast Louisiana, up to Baton Rouge, and over into Mississippi and Alabama before being bought out by RiteAid in the 1990s. At its peak, K&B had over 160 stores, but they hit one of those points where they had to either go national or get pulled into someone who already was national, and New Orleans lost one of its local traditions.

K&B was in every neighborhood in town. When I was at UNO, I worked at the MB in Clearview mall and often ate dinner at the K&B soda fountain there, the last one to close in town. Remember the McKenzie's sign from Frenchmen and Foy? That photo was shot in the parking lot of a K&B (well, it's a RiteAid now, but you get the idea). This K&B was at the corner of N. Broad and Esplanade Avenue, just a short ride on the Broad bus from the A&G cafeteria at Broad and Canal.

And Dixie! The Dixie Brewing Company, located on Tulane Avenue, was the last of the local breweries. Dixie made a crisp, American-style lager, that was on tap at most bars in the city. Some considered it low-rent when compared to a national brew like Bud or Miller. My dad was a big Dixie drinker, and someone gave him a neat Dixie-logo thermal mug. I used to bring that mug to parties when I was in college. Several of my fraternity brothers would get annoyed with me for using the Dixie mug. They were worried that people would think the keg was Dixie rather than Bud, implying that we were low-rent in some way. :-)