> You can eat delicious and unique meals but there are other restaurants where you’ll get ripped off.

Your risk of getting railroaded as a tourist drops dramatically if you stay away from the French Quarter. If you also stay away from any location the hop-on/hop-off buses stop, that drops almost to zero.

I live close enough to go 6-8 times per year. We only go into the Quarter to dine at restaurants that we know (and usually were recommended by natives) or shop at a handful of places whose only location is there.