Audubon Aquarium of the Americas – Food Court

I have been coming here since a little girl. It’s good for the kids. Make sure you check out the outside area where you can feed the birds. Do not eat here!!! There are some awesome restaurants near by!

New Orleans is world renowned for having amazing food. Our chefs win awards and some have even gone on to become TV stars. Apparently the aquarium did not get that memo when they opened their food court. The food here is downright awful.
I realize that the aquarium primarily caters to children and families, but how about throwing the parents a bone and open a good food place? It seems that revenue would increase since I imagine most people avoid the food court all together.
There isn’t much more to say other than to avoid this food court at all costs.

Wow, we had the expensive Papa John’s pizza, and yes, it was much more than Papa John’s would ordinarily charge. Plus, it was worse, because of the limited space they have to cook maybe? Not sure of the reason, but it just wasn’t good. Eat before you go.
Or, eat at the Bug Museum! The bugs were better than the aquarium pizza.

By all that is holy and good in the world, I say unto you, eat before coming to the Aquarium. We did not, because (a) we didn’t plan ahead and our kids were starving, and (b) I like to eat at museums to support the cause, but, oh my, we paid the price.
The Aquarium food court consists solely of a Haagen Dazs, a Papa John’s with the most limited menu imaginable (personal cheese pizza, personal pepperoni pizza, and wings — that’s it), and a generic no-​name grill-​type place presumably run by the museum itself. When we arrived, each was manned by a single bored-​out-​of-​his/​her skull-​looking attendant, and the sparseness of the clientele at all three did not bode well for turnover of the food available. However, we were desperate for lunch, and not feeling like ice cream or greasy pizza for lunch, we reluctantly approached the counter for No-​Name.
Ah — No-​Name — what can I say. First — selection — despite the long list of items on the menu board, No-​Name actually had only a small subset of the items listed — basically whatever was warming under a red light when we walked up — hamburgers, cheese burgers and grilled chicken burgers (no one was actually doing any food prep or cooking that i could see — bad sign) — and the rest were refrigerated pre-​packaged sandwiches on white bread that looked about 3 months old. Second — price. For two tired cheeseburgers and two dry chicken burgers, we paid $ 20. Third — taste. There was none.
Due to cost, I decided to forgo the $ 4 per bottle of water and asked for cups to get some water from the fountain. The clerk told us she was not allowed to give out cups for water (although there was a stack right next to her) but said the Papa John’s counter *might* give us cups. So I had to go over to the other counter, where I hadn’t bought any food, and ask for cups. The attendant there gave me a «who the hell do you think you are» look, walked right past a towering stack of cups, picked up tiny saucer designed for holding ketchup from those big pump dispensers, handed it to me, and stared right at me, as if daring me to complain. Nice. Not feeling up to a confrontation, I just gave up and thanked her for the thimble.
The only thing even slightly positive I can say about the whole experience is that the food court has a very nice view of the Mississippi River from its second floor riverfront vantage point, and that was enjoyable. But it so didn’t make up for the whole crappy experience.
One final note — this review is not intended to suggest the Aquarium itself isn’t good — it’s very good indeed. Just the food court sucks.