New book on Leah Chase aimed at all age groups

By Christine Bordelon
Clarion Herald

A long-time friendship with the late chef Leah Chase prompted Carol Allen, a writer and the academic advisor at The Good Shepherd Nativity School, to muse about the impact and generosity that Chase manifested with every fiber of her being.

“I have never met anyone as loving as Leah Chase,” said Allen, whose second book about Chase, “A Long Way from the Strawberry Patch: The Life of Leah Chase,” is written for younger readers. “I felt so blessed for spending the time I had with her. Leah Chase is the only person you can drop in any square on the grid of races, and she would be welcomed.”

Allen first wrote a biography, “Leah Chase: Listen, I Say Like This,” which was launched in 2001 at the New Orleans Museum of Art followed by a sit-down dinner at Dooky Chase’s Restaurant. Allen called Paris her home at the time and arranged a book reading there and in Washington, D.C., at the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

Recently, Allen collaborated with Chase and Pelican Press to pen a book for children but appealing to all. Most of her interviews with Chase were in 2018, the year before she died.

“I grew to appreciate her more after the first book was written, and especially with the last book since it deals with what happened to Leah after Katrina,” Allen said. “I was overwhelmed by her ability.”

Allen, a 2015 Catholic convert who was raised as a Southern Baptist, tells Chase’s story in letters to God using Chase’s thoughts and struggles at various life stages, beginning with her humble Madisonville beginnings. Chase was the eldest of 11 Lange children, picking strawberries with siblings in a loving family who followed their father’s rules to pray, work and do for others.

She was sent to New Orleans in 1935 to attend St. Mary’s Academy, then in the French Quarter.

The book chronicles Chase, as a young teen, waving to the president (Franklin D. Roosevelt) as he dines at Antoine’s Restaurant, ironing shirts to pay for room and board, graduating from high school in 1942 and learning to be a strong business woman while working at a French Quarter restaurant. She met her future husband, Dooky Chase, whose family’s sandwich shop taught her to triumph over adversity while feeding the famous and unknown alike.

“This book is a testament to Leah’s Catholic faith,” Allen said. “Her life is so important to young girls, especially African-American girls.”

Everyone can learn

The 160-page book reveals how Chase’s Catholic faith led her to choose what was right, to help others and treat every person she encountered with love and humanity – her secret to breaking down barriers, whether economic or racial.

As a bonus, the book reprints popular recipes, including sweet potato biscuits, sweet potato pie, Gumbo z’Herbes (a Creole Lenten tradition started at the restaurant in 1973 on Holy Thursday) and Southern fried chicken. The book also has numerous photos of the Chase family.

Her deep losses are broached, including the 1966 death of her mother Hortensia (who taught her to hate prejudice), her beloved father Charles’ passing in 1983, and the 1990 death of her daughter Emily, who worked beside her at Dooky Chase Restaurant. The book also spotlights her 70-year marriage to musician/restaurateur Dooky Chase, a civil rights activist and Urban League member who died in 2016 and upheld the importance of equality and let Leah be herself.

Her many successes gleam from the pages: feeding U.S. presidents, authors and other “people who are making history”; becoming a New Orleans Museum of Art board member in the 1970s and an art patron of Black artists; publishing her first cookbook in 1988 and second in 2002; cooking in 1992 alongside chef Julia Child, who called her “the Grande Dame of French Cuisine”; and being awarded The Times-Picayune Loving Cup in 1997 (her favorite accolade since it highlighted her community service).

The new book also portrays Chase as the young female chef with dreams in the Disney movie, “The Princess and the Frog,” in 2009, and her role in establishing the Edgar “Dooky” Jr. and Leah Chase Family Foundation to support various causes.

She is seen being painted in her kitchen by artist Gustave Blache III in 2011. Blache’s painting, “Cutting Squash,” was exhibited at The Smithsonian Museum’s Portrait Gallery, and his second work, “Leah, Red Coat Stirring,” was displayed at the National Museum of African American History and Culture. The book also notes that Chase received the James Beard Foundation’s lifetime achievement award in 2016.

But it’s Chase’s humility that defines her. In answer to what she wanted people to say about her, Chase said: “I want people to say I tried my best to help other people and make a difference. Everybody can’t be a leader, but anybody can be a good follower. If you can’t lead, maybe you can help somebody else get up and lead. If you do that, that uplifts you, too. To me, that’s so important.”

“I really believe in God, we all have a responsibility to show love and celebrate happiness,” she said in the book.

Love freely given

The community’s love for Chase was apparent after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when a fundraiser was held at Muriel’s Restaurant, raising $40,000, enabling Dooky Chase’s Restaurant to rebuild and reopen in 2007.

As an appropriate end to the book, Allen uses Chase’s often-spoke  lesson to young people: “Life is about choices.”

™ȼ “One way you learn to make right choices is through watching and listening to others. … That’s how you learn. I didn’t always make the right choices … but you have to learn from your mistakes. The most important thing is don’t make the same mistake twice.”

“You laugh at yourself and you try again.”

“Don’t worry too much about what’s happening to you; think about how you can help others. Your knowledge and energy are best spent on helping others, and doing that helps you forget about your own needs.”

“I think it is a book of love for Leah Chase,” Allen said. “I hope that people will feel her humility and greatness and her, ‘If I can do it, you can, too, and make this world a better place.’ We need more Leah Chases.”

A book signing with 100 free books given away was re-scheduled to Oct. 8 from 4-6 p.m. at Melba’s, 1525 Elysian Fields Ave., New Orleans.

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