In 1946, she married jazz trumpeter and band leader Edgar "Dooky" Chase II. His parents owned a street corner stand in
Tremé, founded in 1941, that sold lottery tickets and homemade
po-boy sandwiches. Chase began working in the kitchen at the restaurant during the 1950s, and over time, Leah and Dooky took over the stand and converted it into a sit-down establishment,
Dooky Chase's Restaurant. She eventually updated the menu to reflect her own family's Creole recipes as well as recipes—such as Shrimp Clemenceau—otherwise available only in whites-only establishments from which she and her patrons were barred. In 2018,
Food & Wine named the restaurant one of the 40 most important restaurants of the past 40 years.
Civil rights movement Dooky Chase became a staple in the black communities of New Orleans, and by the 1960s, became one of the only public places in New Orleans where African Americans could meet and discuss strategies during the
civil rights movement. Leah and her husband Edgar would host black
voter registration campaign organizers, the
NAACP, black political meetings and many other civil leaders at their restaurant, including local civil rights leaders
A. P. Tureaud and
Ernest "Dutch" Morial, and later
Martin Luther King Jr. and the
Freedom Riders. They would hold secret meetings and private strategy discussions in her upstairs meeting rooms while she served them
gumbo and
fried chicken. Dooky Chase had become so popular that even though local officials knew about these "illegal" meetings, the city or local law enforcement could not stop them or shut the doors because of the risk of public backlash. Dooky Chase's Restaurant was key when King and the Freedom Riders came to learn from the
Baton Rouge Bus Boycott. As King and the Freedom Riders were beginning to organize their bus boycott in
Montgomery, they would hold meetings with civil leaders from New Orleans and Baton Rouge in Dooky Chase's meeting rooms to learn about the bus boycotts in Baton Rouge. The plan and organization of the Montgomery bus boycotts were inspired by the boycotts in Baton Rouge. While there were no black-owned banks in African-American communities, people would commonly go to Dooky Chase on Fridays, where Leah Chase and her husband would cash checks for trusted patrons at the bar. Friday nights became popular, as people would cash their checks, have a drink, and order a po-boy.
Art collection Chase studied art in high school, Chase began catering gallery openings for early-career artists during the Civil Rights period, In addition to serving on the board of the New Orleans Museum of Art, she was on the boards of the Arts Council of New Orleans, the Louisiana Children's Museum, the Urban League of Greater New Orleans, and the Greater New Orleans Foundation. charging $75 to $500 per person for a
gumbo z'herbes, fried chicken, and
bread pudding lunch at a posh French Quarter restaurant. The guests consumed 50 gallons of gumbo and raised $40,000 for the 82-year-old Mrs. Chase. While she worked to reopen the restaurant, Chase also joined Women of the Storm, a coalition of women from neighborhoods across the city who joined together to lobby Congress for funds to restore New Orleans and other communities after Hurricanes Katrina and
Rita. Chase was one of the women associated with the group that flew to Washington, D.C., to speak to Congress and the White House.
Reopening and accolades After reopening the doors of Dooky Chase's, Leah Chase fed her creole cuisine to many important figures, including U.S. Presidents
George W. Bush and
Barack Obama. She received the
James Beard Lifetime Achievement award in 2016 for her lifetime's body of work, which had a positive and lasting impact on the way people ate, cooked, and thought about food in New Orleans. Many world renowned chefs, such as
John Besh and
Emeril Lagasse, honored Leah Chase and credited her with perfecting
creole cuisine. Chase fed many celebrities, politicians and activists, such as
Hank Aaron,
Bill Cosby,
Lena Horne,
James Baldwin, and many other prominent figures in the African-American community. In "Early in the Morning,"
Ray Charles sang, “I went to Dooky Chase to get me something to eat.” During the last few years of her life, chef
John Folse had begun to make the traditional gumbo z'herbes for the annual Holy Thursday lunch, under Chase's supervision. ==Death and legacy==