Pat O'Brien’s Bar

Address: 718 St Peter Street,, French Quarter, New Orleans, Louisiana, 70116, United States
Tel: +1 504 525 4823
Website: view Pat O'Brien’s Bar’s website
Door: Open door
Style: Cabaret bar
Food: Bar Snacks
Established: 1933

Review

O'Brien's deserves a mention as it is celebrated as the home of the Hurricane cocktail, a tall, fruity, rum laced drink which was allegedly invented here during World War Two. Many, however, believe that it originated in 1939 at the eponymous Hurricane Bar in New York City, but was popularised at Pat O'Brien's.

Pat O'Brien established this place in 1933 and moved to these premises in December 1942. Today its five bars sprawl across several rooms and a large outside courtyard accessed by an 1817 carriageway entrance lined with crossed muskets. O'Brien's is reputed to have the largest volume business of any bar of a comparable size in the world, accordingly is generally packed with tourists, drawn by location and historical reputation rather than any taste in drinks.

O'Brien's sells thousands upon thousands of Hurricanes, all in the tall, shapely glass of the same name, and all made using the bar's own 'original Hurricane cocktail mix'. If you must join the tourists, I strongly advise you resist the temptation to sample one of these lurid concoctions.