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Mardi Gras Museum

in The Too Busy to Diet Blog on June 6, 2017

                         Mardi Gras Museum

No trip to New Orleans would be complete without seeing the Mardi Gras Parade or learning about it. On our recent trip to New Orleans, we made a trip to the Mardi Gras Museum. For those of you who do not know, Mardi Gras means “Fat Tuesday”. It is the day before Ash Wednesday that signifies the end to eating sweets during Lent.

The Mardi Gras Museum has changed a lot since I went over 15 years ago. The museum was in a small warehouse building that stored the many floats that are used in the Mardi Gras parade. Today, it is larger, holds more floats, utilizes styrofoam as the main product for floats, and it has an interesting film at the tour beginning of the tour. It tells the history of Mardi Gras and the making of floats for the parade.

It is also interesting that the styrofoam can be more easily and cheaply used. This allows floats to be updated for the times, to change the Mardi Gras Theme, or to be used for other functions.

Today, the Mardi Gras Museum also hosts functions for large corporations and makes logos for their companies that are used in their marketing.
The Mardi Gras Museum also uses new technology that allows for computerized machines to make a large amount of the floats that are then painted and displayed.

I would recommend going to the Mardi Gras Museum the next time you go to New Orleans. And the King Cake is also delicious. More to follow on the King Cake.

Jacqueline King, Ms, RDN, CDE, FADA
Author: Too Busy to Diet