The state of Louisiana, which produces one-third of the nation's oysters, has mustered the first quasi-official response to new FDA guidelines banning the sale of unprocessed Gulf oysters from April through October.

The strict new rules, designed to combat the deadly Vibrio vulnificus bacteria that swarms in warm water, require Texas, Florida and Louisiana oyster processors to freeze, heat, radiate or pressurize their oysters. But oyster connoisseurs worry their favored bivalves won't be the only casualty of post-harvest processing; Insiders suspect the law will also kill the Gulf coast's oyster industry.

Photo: Andrews McMeel

'My New Orleans - The Cookbook: 200 of My Favorite Recipes from My Hometown'
By John Besh
Photographs by Ditte Isager
Andrews McMeel -- 2009
Buy it on Amazon

Chef John Besh's magnum opus on the food of his hometown could easily be mistaken for a coffee table-style photography book edited by someone with one heck of a food fetish. That'd be only partially correct.

Besh celebrates and contextualizes New Orleans cuisine within a reverent, passionate travelogue and memoir based around the ingredients and food rituals of a full year in the Big Easy. In this 374-page volume, the chef, restaurateur (including August, Lüke, Besh Steak, Domenica, La Provence and the upcoming the American Sector at the National WWII Museum), "Next Iron Chef" contender, former Marine and father of four weaves an intimate, illustrated narrative of a life lived deliciously in one of the world's most important food cities.

Through touching vignettes from his childhood, emergence into chefhood and post-Katrina rebuilding efforts, as well as informative sidebars about key Creole and Cajun ingredients and paens to his favorite food haunts, Besh stokes and slakes a multitude of hungers for lovers of this city on the mend.

It's also one hell of a cookbook.

See what we tested and find out whether the book's worth buying after the jump.

While you're waiting for Michael Thomas Hastings' "Top Chef Masters" recap, snack on this mini interview with former contender John Besh. The New Orleans chef and author stopped by Slashfood HQ earlier this week to chat about his Top Chef Masters predictions, being judged by bloggers and why he won't be strapping an arm behind his back again anytime soon.

Pre-order My New Orleans: The Cookbook and visit ChefJohnBesh.com.

Shaken and stirred at Tales. Photo: Sara Bonisteel

Well another Tales of the Cocktail has come and gone, and Slashfood made it through relatively unscathed. New Orleans was filled with the world's best bartenders who met to tipple together and share a bit of their mixology wisdom for throngs of (slightly tipsy) fans during the five-day bacchanal.

James Meehan of New York's PDT was named American Bartender of the Year on July 11, while "Imbibe!" author David Wondrich got a nod for his cocktail writing and Dale DeGroff for his latest book offering, "The Essential Cocktail."

Get our favorite moments and more photos after the jump.

The Randolph's Jason Littrell at Tales of the Cocktail. Photo: Sara Bonisteel

We're moving a little slower today -- in part because it's sweltering in New Orleans. We'd hate to blame the 40 different libations created by mixologists amid a Mardi Gras exhibition at the Presbytere for a spirited happy hour at Tales of the Cocktail, but that might be at play too.

Yesterday saw seminars on the hows of alcohol -- how to taste, how to pair, how to make vegan clover clubs (substitute soy lecithin for the egg whites). It also saw some of the world's most famous mixologists shaking their stuff -- Dale DeGroff, David Wondrich, Junior Merino. Keep following us on Twitter. And click on for a gallery of on-the-scene photos.

About $45,000 worth of cocktail shakers. Photo: Sara Bonisteel

This year's Tales kicked off with a toast on Wednesday, and then mixologists and cocktail aficionados got down to the business of drink with seminars on everything from starting a bar to using fresh ingredients. Slashfood dropped by a talk on the history of truly classic -- and highly collectible -- cocktail shakers.

There we eyed these four beauties: a lighthouse, two Zeppelin shakers and Norman Bel Geddes' (real-life dad of Miss Ellie from TV's "Dallas") skyscraper design -- which the jovial Jim Walker told us in his most serious voice are worth more than an average year of college.

We're heading out to catch a streetcar to learn more about the molecular DNA of classic cocktails. Check back later for more photos and keep following us as we Tweet from the scene!

Get the official Tales cocktail after the jump.

New Orleans has long been a cocktail town. Photo: nerdling/flickr

Tales of the Cocktail returns this week to New Orleans for its seventh year. Slashfood is on our way to discover the latest and greatest libations. We'll be Tweeting from the scene in the French Quarter. Check our Tweet feed here, and keep an eye out for new posts each day throughout the week. And if you're there, let's Tweet up!

Invariably, the first thing I do when I get to New Orleans is seek out food. It starts with an iced mocha from PJs Coffee (only because Rue de la Course has yet to open an outpost at Louis Armstrong International airport). Then it's on to the po'boy.

Typically, I head to Guy's Po-Boy on Magazine Street, where the dressed, fried-shrimp sandwich on airy Leidenheimer bread is like a second-line celebration to the crustacean.

But on my most recent visit, friends were raving about a new place called Mahony's. The shop won the best fried po'boy at last year's New Orleans Po-Boy Preservation Festival for their "peacemaker," a traditional fried oyster sandwich that they gussy up with bacon and cheddar. (For a peacemaker po'boy recipe, check out John Folse's site here.)

Mahony's fried oysters are delicious (I nibbled one off my friend's sandwich), but the chance to have my first fried green tomato po'boy couldn't be missed. Mahony's pairs two thick slices of the fried unripe tomatoes with grilled shrimp and a tangy remoulade sauce.

Slashfoodies in the Po'Boy Nation: What gets your mouthwatering?

Snowballs have to be one of my all-time favorite New Orleans treats. I once spent a whole summer trying to track down a "wedding cake"-flavored snowball whose sugary syrup made the ball of shaved ice taste exactly like store-bought icing.

So I was more than intrigued when I walked into the Swizzle Stick Bar at Café Adelaide in New Orleans last Thursday and saw Talia Neal-Walthall's creation, Sailor Jerry's Snowball, on the drink menu. The young mixologist says she created it just to see if she could.

Talia uses Sailor Jerry rum, passionfruit syrup, muddled blackberries and fresh lime juice in place of the snowball's traditional flavored syrup and pours the cocktail over the requisite ball of crushed ice.

It looks like a high-society concoction, but halfway through the drink, you remember it's a snowball. You have to drop any inhibitions about making a mess, take a deep breath and chomp down hard on your drink.

Of course, if snowballs aren't your thing, the Swizzle Stick's resident mixologist, Lu Brow, makes a mean Corpse Reviver No. 2. Brow's signature drink is a "soft cocktail" made with gin and elderberry liqueur that she's dubbed the Ginnifer Flowers.

Well kids, this is it. The last Top Chef until the finals in New Orleans. The show opens with a Quick Fire in which the chef'testants must do something interesting, innovative and delicious with eggs. Wylie Dufresne of WD-50 in New York is the guest judge. He's known for his edgy use of molecular gastronomy and so these can't just be two soft boiled eggs with toast soldiers (check out a teaser for the QF here).

Once they get through the Quick Fire, they must cook for Wylie, along with the famed French chef Jacques Pepin. With just Stephan, Hosea, Leah, Carla and Fabio left, who will be headed to the finals?

Personally, I'm still smarting over the loss of Jamie a little, I would have far preferred seeing her tonight over Leah (for more Top Chef misfires, check out this gallery from Television Without Pity, I thought they were right on). Who do you think will be progressing to the finals?

Nothing tastes like a good blackening. And it's not even hard.

Many people shy away from blackened foods, thinking that blackening means charring the meat, the vegetable, whatever is being blackened.

Au contraire! Blackening refers to what happens to the Cajun spices! The spices get really hot and kazaam! They explode in the heat, turning black and infusing your fish, meat, vegetables or what-have-you with their flavor. Cajun, delicious, and a lot better for you than frying.

Check out instructions on how to make two seriously delicious blackened catfish fillets after the jump.

They call New Orleans the Big Easy, but yesterday was big, but not easy, as I spent my first full day here, prior to the start of Tales of the Cocktail. I am one of the 24 judges for the 2008 Ministry of Rum Tasting Competition, a strict rum judging event coordinated by the Ministry of Rum at Tales. There was a long list of people who were considered as judges for this event and Ed Hamilton, the head of the Ministry, spent several weeks winnowing down the list to some of the top rummies around.

We met at the famous Arnauds restaurant for the event. As we chatted before the judging began it soon became evident just how knowledgeable this crew was. Rum distillers, importers, writers and bloggers, and of course rum collectors. I thought I had a nice collection of spirits with over 500 bottles, of which around 100 of them are exceptional rums. I've given away more than that of mediocre rums over the past year or three, saving just the best. One of my fellow judges has over 800 top of the line rums in his collection. The least of which makes my best look like a cheap $1.99 pint of generic white rumbullion. When you have pre-embargo Cuban rums and rums over 100 years old in your collection you're on a different level of connoisseurship than I. I just want to try some little 1/4 ounce sips of a few dozen of his collection one day and I'll be happy. Just the thought has me drooling like a drunk.

It started as an innocent hobby. I'd pick a cookbook or two up at thrift stores and used bookstores when I was traveling or visiting my parents. Then I got a real job and had a bit of disposable income and so started filling the gaps in my cookbook collection, buying the ones that I had always longed for. Then I acquired books from the collections of others, including my aunts Flora and Anne, reader Kate and the mother of a friend of a friend. Suddenly my apartment was overflowing with cookbooks. I love the abundance of cookbooks, but at times it makes walking through the living room challenging.

So I was thrilled to discover on Shuna's blog that the Southern Food and Beverage Museum is in need of cookbook donations. They are located in New Orleans and lost more than half of their collection to Hurricane Katrina back in 2005. They are looking for new and used cookbooks that have something to do with Southern food, cooking and culture. I plan on culling my collection in order find anything that they might be interested in and putting together a package for them.

If you have some appropriate volumes in your collection, you can send your (fully tax-deductible) donations to:

Southern Food & Beverage Museum
attn. Liz Williams
1 Poydras Street, #169
New Orleans, Louisiana 70130

Love cocktails? Spirits? Want to know how to make your own bitters, infused syrups or tinctures? Interested in bartending techniques or the history of the craft? Or, heck, do you like to drink? Brothers and sisters, have I got an event for you. . .

Tales Of The Cocktail is the only event of its kind. From July 16-20th bartenders, spirit representatives, notable authors, mixologists and enthusiastic barflies will gather in New Orleans to celebrate, attend seminars and drink a whole bunch of hooch. Tickets are available on the TOTC site. Hope to see you there.

Additionally, I've been invited to be a participating writer for the all-star blog site that they are putting together for the event, Talesblog.com. In the coming months, we will be previewing the events, seminars and notable participants of this wonderful event. I guarantee you won't find a giddier bunch.