Last Friday evening, The Maroon’s Life & Times staff had the worst idea ever. No, literally – ever.

We decided it would be fun and informative to do a story that let our readers know where to eat around the clock, from the evening to the wee hours of the morning, all the way until breakfast.

We wanted to prove that New Orleans isn’t just full of high-end restaurants and sappy upscale bistros. There are plenty of affordable places around town with great food to eat whether your stomach is growling at 7 p.m. or 7 a.m. We wanted to visit and eat at 12 restaurants in 12 hours.

The original idea for this story came from a similar story we found in The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, though with one major difference. They visited 24 restaurants in 24 hours.

We decided we would die after 24 hours and opted for the less vomit-likely option, option B – just 12.

It was a great idea in theory when we started plotting out our adventure, eatery by eatery, one grease pit after another. But it would come back to bite us.

The plan was to get the dish that each place is famous for, a way to get the “full experience” of each restaurant (for example, beignets at Cafe DuMonde). Each participant would have a taste or two of each dish and that would be it.

Needless to say, our eyes were far bigger than our stomachs and by 4:30 a.m., after only nine restaurants in nine hours, we called it quits for the sake of our bodies, our pride and to save us from the embarrassment of vomiting in front of each other.

No wait, by that time, Lindsey Netherly, our news editor, had already thrown up.

Here is an account of our gastrointestinal adventure.

7:03 p.m. Café Nino, 1510 S. Carrolton Ave.

We arrived at our destination, just a five-minute drive from campus, with healthy appetites and hearty optimism, fearless before the world of pain we were about to encounter.

Caf̩ Nino has a classic diner feel, with food displayed front-and-center Рno frills and nothing fancy, just some of the best Italian home cooking to satisfy the most homesick of Philly-steak-loving Phillies or pizza-craving Brooklynites.

With this student-friendly menu and price range, we couldn’t help but start here, if not just for the warm-and-fuzzy vibe and the just-like-home comfort food before our adventure. Our chicken and eggplant Parmesan and a side of lasagna contained a stellar cheese-to-meat ratio, reminding us of immaculate Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pizza in all its gooey glory.

These perfectly-sized portions make for the perfect super-casual lunch or dinner for two for less than $20.

8:04 p.m. The Creole Creamery, 4924 Prytania St.

Housed in the original McKenzie’s Bakery building, Creole Creamery is the best ice cream parlor in town, fitting nicely in your dinner-and-a-movie budget on a fun date.

Since 2004, the neon McKenzie’s sign glowing above Prytania has invited patrons to sample the rotating menu of homemade flavors, from exotic delicacies to the indulgent classics and everywhere in between.

Diners can sit at the old-time soda-fountain counter while checking out the pink-painted walls, checkerboard flooring and children of all ages pressed against the glass ice cream cases.

This was the best-sounding place for a closer on our Italian meal, but we didn’t realize until later it may have been too sweet for our stomachs that early on. Dairy that early in the game – so stupid.

An even more ridiculous decision was our choice of ice cream: The Tchoupitoulas Challenge. Combining eight of our favorite flavors, with eight toppings, our Tchoupitoulas was a mountain of sugary death. A sweet, delicious death.

We sold our souls to flavors of strawberry lemonade, toffee chip, bananas foster, red velvet cake, big island chocolate, oatmeal maple cookie, honey pie and burnt sugar gelato. Topped with a ludicrous amount of toppings, we scored a great deal for only $15.

As we ate bite after bite of sugary heaven, everything began melting into what can only be described as ice cream soup. It prompted our photographer and chief copy editor Kathleen McCann to say, “Look at this cherry covered in crap,” in surprise to the amount of toppings we added.

Try the Tchoupitoulas challenge next time you visit – but try not to embarrass yourself in front of your date.

Eat the entire Tchoupitoulas bowl without any help and you’ll get your name on a plaque in the dining room, where you’ll be immortalized for your lack of self-control.

But hey, everybody loves ice cream. Maybe even your date.

8:48 p.m. August Moon, 3635 Prytania St.

We know: We got there too fast. But hey, all that ice cream and no sugar rush or feeling of supremacy? Give us a break, we’re professionals.

We opened the doors to this Chinese/Vietnamese hideaway with the confidence of those without abused digestive systems. The contemporary, earthy decor and artwork confused our editor in chief who believed we had stepped into a jungle when he asked “Am I in a rainforest?”

But August Moon’s endless menu and polite staff make for one of the best sit-down restaurants when you’re tight on cash.

Not only is the food great, the music is so absolutely perfect you’ll question your life’s purpose. Was it extreme coincidence that the three greatest songs of all time played while we dined? Celine Dion’s “All By Myself,” Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose” and Michael Bolton’s “How am I Supposed to Live Without You?” Call it luck, but we like to think this was destiny. August Moon, tell us: How are we supposed to live without you?

Our Vietnamese hot and sour soup came with large shrimp, crisp veggies and chunks of juicy pineapple to counter the spice. Our Triple Delight, a combination of beef, shrimp, scallops and vegetables in a garlic sauce made for a hearty meal.

Oh, but that’s not all we ordered.

The rest of our staff insisted on ordering what they wanted as if they were ordering their last meal. Chicken Fried Rice, Crab Rangoons and Chinese Eggrolls were all very tasty, but in the end we had a few bites too many.

As we devoured the meals, McCann suggested we should have worn trash bags.

10 p.m. Puccino’s, 3128 Magazine St.

Our failed attempt to enter the Mexican-heaven of Nacho Mama’s brought us to our backup – the gourmet coffee house Puccino’s.

The former home of Rue de la Course, which moved across the street a little more than two years ago, now houses a classy Uptown Italian coffee house, popular among families, students and anyone looking for quality Italian coffee.

Hailing from Connecticut, our gracious barista, Akrim Kaki, said he loves getting to know the customers at this comfy, upscale cafe. “I remember everyone’s first and last name,” he said. Kaki served us a round of his favorite, the tasty iced Puccino, to cool us down and ready our caffeine-deprived-student bodies.

With a higher priced menu than most local coffee hotspots, Puccino’s may best be suited to impress your parents or a date.

But our clinging-to-our-reporters-notebooks desperation and charm won over the hearts of our friendly baristas, who gave us a few samples of their pricey and mouth-watering frozen Puccino. This dessert-like drink is no ordinary coffee, blended with ice cream and topped with a healthy heap of whipped cream.

Thanks, Akrim, for sending us into a collective diabetic coma.

From this point forward, we reached a point of delirium that made Paula Abdul’s exhaustion symptoms seem juvenile.

10:49 p.m. St. Charles Tavern, 1433 St. Charles Ave.

“World famous and locally infamous.” This slogan is slapped against the unpretentious, home-style menu. And they aim to keep it that way.

Open 24/7, this Uptown tradition serves some of the best food of its kind. Despite having some of the greatest eats, don’t expect the cleanest table or a polite wait staff, noted by Nicole Wroten’s delirious scribbled message slid across the table: “I hate old lady. Old lady hate me,” in reference to our server.

This is a diner for easy-going, fourthmeal diners with a slim wallet and a love for New Orleans – in all it’s greasy, sloppy, cheap and delicious glory.

We asked our server what the restaurant is famous for, to which she replied “Nothing … shrimp po-boy.” So shrimp po-boy it was.

When it comes to searching for the best po-boy in town, nothing could be more difficult, but St. Charles Tavern sure comes close, especially with their generous serving of French fries and the overflowing fried shrimp. Alongside a plate of their popular red beans and rice with smoked sausage, our meal was complete.

We conquered our plates like champion restaurateurs. At this point, our troops should have accepted defeat and gone down with the ship, but the brave Marooners pressed forward.

12:04 a.m. Rosey’s Diner, 200 Magazine St.

Lit up under the graying landscape of a downtown construction site, this classic diner could pass for a mobster-movie set. You would expect to see Dick Tracy sitting in the booth next to yours and Al Capone shaking your hand at the door.

Formerly the setting for familiar all-night eatery Huey’s, Rosey’s, with its brightly-lit neon rose sign, puts a glamorous spin on your run-of-the-mill 24-hour breakfast joints.

Lining the walls are black-and-white photographs of trains, reminding eaters of the glory days, while high-back booths allow for a quiet late-night breakfast. Even the wait staff epitomized the classic feel of the restaurant wearing bow ties and crisp white shirts.

We tasted their impressive French toast and the arm-sized breakfast burrito. Or the ‘armito.’ True, the breakfast burrito might not have sounded like the perfect choice when trying to conserve our stomachs, but it was covered in cheese. Who says no to cheese?

12:50 a.m. Lucky Dog stand, corner of Bourbon and Canal streets

Desperate, hard-partying, Bourbon Street-bound Loyola student: Keep in mind the ingredients of most hot dogs are largely inconsistent. But don’t let that stop you when you’re on a mission for food.

Originally founded by the Loyacano brothers in 1949, the Lucky Dog cart is a New Orleans tradition, dishing out dogs to hungry folks of all walks of life, including, yes, the Hurricane-wielding, the bead-wearing, the alcohol-fueled, those in search for a bite to settle their stomachs.

The cart man asked us what we wanted on our dog.

“Everything,” we replied.

Too nauseous and terrified to eat it ourselves, we searched for one hungry soul wandering the sleaze of Bourbon. After about 15 or 20 minutes, we finally found someone who didn’t think we had dropped the Lucky Dog on the ground. He devoured it more quickly than we thought he would and headed down the street into a drunken abyss.

This could be a turning point for The Maroon – we now apparently donate hot dogs to the drunk. This also gave us time to digest our six meals, time to reflect on the horrible acts of gluttony we accidentally stumbled into.

Emergency Medical Technicians raised a man clutching his side, covering a large wound, onto a stretcher and into an ambulance on Canal Street on our way back to the car.

A harrowing tale encompassing our city’s violence or possible foreshadowing for our unfortunate conclusion?

2 a.m. Tiffin Inn Pancake House, 6601 Veterans Memorial Blvd.

We dragged ourselves into our eighth restaurant of the night, the locally notorious Tiffin Inn.

With new post-Katrina hours, Tiffin Inn’s 24-hour weekends are a welcome invitation to hipsters into the ironic. Our vaguely foreign host, dressed for a funeral at 2 a.m. and generating the wonderfully creepy vibes Tiffin Inn made famous, greeted us as we sat down.

We sat amidst a sea of red Naugahyde furniture in the quiet dining room, lit by several over-the-top chandeliers. This is the last vestige of instantly loveable, tacky, 1970s diners, where one could imagine the polyester-clad clientele of 30 years ago.

Leaving behind beehive-hairdo waitresses and diners with Burt Reynolds-worthy mustaches, Tiffin Inn left the timeless menu and untouched interiors, fake plants and all.

The menu was one of the largest we had seen, with international breakfast dishes and localized lunch and dinner options. We headed into our second breakfast with a fluffy plate-sized pecan waffle and a thick and cheesy ham-and-cheese omelet.

Reaching the peak of our gastronomic adventure, news editor Lindsey Netherley closed our spectacular Tiffin Inn experience as she vomited in the bathroom. From there we said farewell to our gracious staff and the faint Muzak renditions of pop songs from many years ago.

Tiffin Inn is the America we all know and love: fried food, 24-hour breakfast and vomit-filled toilets.

2:58 a.m. Bud’s Broiler, 2008 Clearview Parkway

Coupled with our food-induced delirium, listening to Haddaway’s “What is Love?” suggested we entered a burger joint of a more sensual nature. Knowing we couldn’t have possibly challenged a burger or cheese fries at that hour, we opted for Bud’s famous onion rings and their classic fried pie, a grand total of just more than $3.

This calorie-climbing late-night snack is available 24 hours, thanks to the new hours in place at this location, making it a perfect spot for the hungry insomniac. Or graveyard shifters such as the EMS team that was sitting at a table across from us and we believed were going to drive us to a hospital after we went into diabetic shock.

As Alex Woodward and Ramon Vargas, our sports editor, removed the onion rings from the grease-stained brown bag, Wroten had a vomit alert with one whiff. Placing her hands over her mouth, she and everyone else knew that this had to be the last stop.

With Wroten’s head firmly rested on the table in agony, the entourage realized we were seconds away from concluding our journey.

The Conclusion …

Our next scheduled stop was the birthplace of regret, the International House of Pancakes. But thinking about pancakes while smelling fried everything told us we had had enough. Perhaps it was just our inability to keep our eyes open that gave us the closing signal.

Stomach aches and the possibility of our kidneys failing led us to take Vargas’ advice and let his medical resident sister take our blood pressure at 3:48 a.m.

Just a mile or so from Bud’s, we reconvened in Vargas’ laundry room and braced for the reality that his sister would think we were utter idiots.

Indeed, when she reached into her bag and got her sphygmometer (we looked it up), she looked at us with eyes that said, “Seriously?”

Wroten went first and after some fake crying and a pet of Vargas’ 11-pound cat, she came back with a normal reading. Woodward scared the cat away when he sat down and also came back with a normal reading, though Vargas’ sister said it was a little elevated.

In the middle of the living room, we decided to call it quits.

During our final weigh-in upon our return to campus, the scale told us Wroten gained six pounds and Woodward added 10. We put on a total of 16 pounds and lost something very important: our dignity.

Our initial plan to give our fellow students a taste of New Orleans’ late-night dining fell through just a few restaurants in.

But after nine meals, nine restaurants and nine filled stomachs, including our hot dog-eating friend, we knew it was time to retire the Worst Idea Ever.

Alex Woodward can be reached at [email protected]. Nicole Wroten can be reached at [email protected].