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Leah Chase
Appears in
By Battman
Published 2019
Leah Chase, the Queen of Creole and a light in the culinary world, passed away in June, leaving behind a City of New Orleans that was forever changed. In the course of seven decades, she’d become one of the most influential chefs in the nation. Her restaurant, Dooky Chase, became one of the most well-known and significant in the city, a hub for the African-American community and a meeting place for artists, politicians, civil rights organizers and Freedom Riders.
Leyah (Leah) Lange was born the second of thirteen children in Madisonville, Louisiana. She left home as a teenager to live with an aunt in New Orleans while attending high school. After graduating and working a series of jobs about town, she married Edgar “Dooky” Chase, a trumpet player and bandleader whose parents owned a sandwich shop in the Treme neighborhood.