The Mardi Gras Price Index: What a Hurricane, a Po-Boy and a Beignet Cost Over Time
The Mardi Gras Price Index: What a Hurricane, a Po-Boy and a Beignet Cost Over Time
The Economist has its Big Mac index. We wanted something with a little more New Orleans in it, so we built a basket of the things visitors actually buy during Carnival: a Hurricane, a shrimp po-boy, a plate of beignets, a café au lait, a Sazerac and a king cake. Then we went looking for what each one cost on old menus, and set the result against national inflation.
The short version: since March 2015, our basket rose about 46%. Restaurant prices across the US rose about 57%, and prices overall about 42%[12]. But the basket is a mix of winners and laggards, and some of it rests on thin data. Here is what we found and how far to trust it.
What each item did
Every price below comes from a menu or dated page we could open, linked in the sources. The last two columns show what US restaurant prices did over the exact same months.
| Item | Then | Now | The item | US restaurant prices |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hurricane (Pat O'Brien's) | $11.50 (Jul 2021) | $12.50 (Dec 2025) | +9% | +27% |
| Large shrimp po-boy (Domilise's) | $15 (Oct 2015) | $16 (Oct 2022) | +7% | +32% |
| Beignets, order of three (Café du Monde) | $3.85 (Nov 2022) | $4.53 (Jun 2026) | +18% | +16% |
| Café au lait, hot, regular (Café du Monde) | $2.94 (Nov 2022) | $3.60 (Jun 2026) | +22% | +16% |
| Sazerac (Sazerac Bar) | $14 (Mar 2015) | $22 (Oct 2026) | +57% | +57% |
| King cake, original cinnamon (Dong Phuong) | $24 (Feb 2023) | $27 (Jan 2026) | +13% | +12% |
A few things stand out.
The Hurricane barely moved. Pat O'Brien's menu lists it at $11.50 in a copy archived in July 2021[1] and $12.50 in one archived in December 2025[2]. That is a rise of about 9% while restaurant prices rose about 27%. The menu describes the drink as 4 oz of rum blended with 4 oz of Hurricane mix, and says the glass is sold separately.
The po-boy held the line too. A large shrimp po-boy at Domilise's went from $15[3] to $16[4] between 2015 and 2022, and the small stayed at $12 on both menus. National restaurant prices rose about 32% over those years.
Café du Monde went the other way. An order of three beignets went from $3.85[5] to $4.53[6], still listed the same in June 2026[7]. A regular hot café au lait went from $2.94 to $3.60. Both rose faster than restaurant prices overall. Café du Monde lists its prices before sales tax and takes cash only.
The Sazerac kept pace almost exactly. The Sazerac Bar listed it at $14 on a winter 2014-15 menu[8] and lists it at $22 today[9]. That is a 57% rise, and restaurant prices rose 57% too.
King cake rose in step with inflation. Dong Phuong's original cinnamon king cake went from $24[10] to $27[11] for pickup.
Why the basket line is a first sketch
The reasons to be careful:
- Menu dates are capture dates. The Hurricane menu we archived in July 2021 sits at a web address dated June 2020, so the $11.50 may have been in place well before the snapshot. We use the date the page was archived, not an unknown printing date.
- Different places, different years. Each item has its own start date, so we compare every item only with national prices over its own months. The combined line chains the items together, assuming steady growth between two known prices.
- National, not local. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes no New Orleans restaurant-price series, so we compare against the national figures for food away from home and for all items[12]. One month, October 2025, was never published because of the federal funding lapse, and our chart draws a straight line across it.
- Menu prices, not receipts. We have no tax, tip or happy-hour pricing, and sizes differ between sources.
What we could not find
Earlier Hurricane prices (before 2021) are not on any archived menu we could open. King cake prices from Haydel's and Gambino's exist, but they are shipped packages in changing sizes, so we left them out. Randazzo's old order pages show no prices at all. We would rather leave a gap than guess.
Help us make it better
The index gets sharper with every real price. If you buy a Hurricane or a po-boy this Carnival, you can report the price you paid on the index page. We check each report by hand, store only the item, price, date and an optional note, and publish a median only once at least three people have reported the same item.
The chart, every sourced price, and a form to report what you paid.
See the Carnival Index →Frequently asked questions
How much is a Hurricane at Pat O'Brien's?
Pat O'Brien's menu listed the Hurricane at $12.50 in a copy archived in December 2025. The glass is sold separately. Prices change, so check the current menu.
How much does a po-boy cost in New Orleans?
It depends on the shop and the filling. A large shrimp po-boy was $16 at Domilise's on its October 2022 menu and $17.39 at Parkway Bakery and Tavern on its menu when we checked in October 2026. Sizes and shrimp differ, so these are not a like-for-like comparison.
Have New Orleans food prices risen faster than inflation?
In our small basket it was mixed. Café du Monde's beignets and café au lait rose faster than US restaurant prices from late 2022, while the Hurricane and the Domilise's po-boy rose more slowly over the periods we could document.
Cover photo: "Hurricane cocktail at Pat O'Brien's Bar, New Orleans" by MusikAnimal, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Sources
- Pat O'Brien's drinks menu (PDF, archived 31 July 2021)
- Pat O'Brien's drinks menu (PDF, archived 6 December 2025)
- Domilise's Po-Boy & Bar menu (PDF, October 2015)
- Domilise's Po-Boy & Bar menu (PDF, October 2022)
- Cafe du Monde menu (archived 28 November 2022)
- Cafe du Monde menu (archived 9 February 2025)
- Cafe du Monde menu (archived 16 June 2026)
- Sazerac Bar winter 2014-15 menu (PDF, archived 19 March 2015)
- The Roosevelt New Orleans: Sazerac Bar menu
- Dong Phuong Bakery king cake page (archived 2 February 2023)
- Dong Phuong Bakery king cake page (archived 27 January 2026)
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Consumer Price Index (CPI-U, food away from home and all items)
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