In the Spotlight 504 by Karla Marie

06/11/2026

06/04/2026

I just read Who Dat Coffee Cafe LLC 's Chef Owner Craig Nero's post

"The Creole tomato doesn't get enough credit.

It's not just a tomato. It's a whole Louisiana thing... grown in the rich Mississippi River Delta soil, arriving every summer like an old friend who never disappoints."

So true.

Sweet, meaty, and packed with a depth of flavor that anything store-bought could never touch.

This weekend, the city is celebrating 40 years of showing up for it. The 40th Annual Creole Tomato Festival is at the French Market June 6 and 7, free and open to the public, with live music, second lines, cooking demos, and more than ten food vendors all building their menus around the star of the show.

Catch the Krewe of Dolly in the second line to kick off the Festival on Saturday at 10:30am and the Double Ds performing in Sunday!

And right now, before you make it down to the Quarter, Chef Craig Nero at Who Dat Coffee Cafe in the Marigny is already doing it justice. His housemade Shrimp Remoulade, tangy and perfectly seasoned and very New Orleans, stuffed inside a beautiful ripe Creole tomato. The kind of plate that feels like it was always supposed to exist.

This is what summer in New Orleans tastes like.

📍 Who Dat Coffee Cafe · 2401 Burgundy St · Open daily 7am–2pm
📍 Creole Tomato Festival · French Market · June 6 & 7 · Free

06/03/2026

Born from Grief, Built for the Streets.

Last year, and into this year, my Latin American community was attacked. In ways that were visible, deliberate, and designed to make us feel small, unwelcome, and afraid. All I wanted to do was take my latinidad into the streets. Loud. Unapologetic. Grieving. To display it. To scream it. To cry it into existence where no one could ignore our pain.

I knew art had to be at the center of my healing.

Art holds what words cannot. It speaks in color and texture and silence and spectacle all at once. So when I looked at what I was feeling... what my community needed... Las Fridas Krewe is what I saw.

Frida Kahlo did not paint from comfort. She painted from fracture. From a political consciousness that refused to pretend the world was safe when it was not. She put her pain on the canvas and called it beautiful. That is what this krewe is rooted in. Not a costume. A lineage of women who refused to disappear.

Las Fridas Krewe was born from heartbreak, resistance, culture, and love. Supported by allies who choose to stand beside us in solidarity, celebration, and shared humanity.

Are we a dance krewe? No. A marching krewe? No. We are a Show Up and Be Fierce Krewe. We gather. We create art. We create change by simply existing where people can see us.

Art that tells the truth is rarely quiet. It will unsettle some. In that case, we lean into discomfort, parading in the street.

What began as grief becomes a movement. Color. Community. Visibility. Inclusion. A living declaration that we are here with beauty and power.

On June 13, we make our first public appearance at New Orleans Pride Fest. Not marching... standing beside. Beside every person who has ever been told their love, their culture, their body, their story takes up too much space. This city has always known that the streets belong to the people. Las Fridas Krewe is showing up to remind everyone who's watching that we are the people, too. Loud. Colorful. Grieving. Joyful. Alive. And we see you... every community that has ever had to fight just to exist in the open air.

I am so incredibly proud to bring this to life.

Studioshaktinola.com/krewe