Etcetera

Meet: Mardi Gras doubloon coin soaps from Etsy shop the Bathtub Bakery. The champagne scented soaps are sold in sets of three — one gold, green, and purple — each embossed witha fleur-de-lis, flecked with gold mica, and wrapped together in beads (in case you don’t think you’ll acquire enough of those over the next two months). Each trio is $7.

Eat: King cake macaroon’s at Sucré. The Southern Adonis of macaroons is offering their seasonal Carnival variation through Lundi Gras. The Mardi Gras themed confections are constituted by one green cookie, one yellow cookie, and a purple, king cake flavored mousseline tucked in between. The macaroons are available in both stores (about $2 each) and online ($31.50 for 15 pieces)

Drink: Your cake and eat it too. With nearly two month until Mardi Gras, or as I like to refer to it ‘ King Cake Season’, you might very well o.d. on the confection unless you consume it in alternative forms. Enter: Bourbon House‘s king cake cocktail ($8). The play on a Bourbon milk punch contains a mixture of Old New Orleans Rum, in-house vanilla gelato, Louisiana citrus, orgeat syrup (almonds, sugar, and orange flower water) and is topped with green, gold, and purple sprinkles and, of course, a baby.

Listen: To your music from reclaimed objects. Local artist and physicist (now there’s a combo you don’t stumble upon every day) Timothy Schuler incorporates electronics into various found objects and reclaimed building materials — for instance, an amplifier housed in an old wooden box or a speaker for your mobile device, made of an cigar box. The pieces are available at the Ariodante Gallery. Prices start at $130.

Play: Illustrator Dalt Wonk‘s masquerade themed riddle book. Just in time for Carnival, when anyone can disguise themselves as anything, Wonk has released The Riddles of Existence, a set of fifty large cards — each comprised of a riddle and an illustrated costume; the illustration functions as either an answer or hint about the riddle. The answer key lists the solutions in no specific order too, so you be forced to use the process of elimination to solve them. The book is available for $45 at Octavia Books.

Chelsea Lee is associate editor at NolaVie. Email comments to her at chelsea@nolavie.com.