Foodie Obsessed

Emeril Lagasse Sours New Orleans?

by Tracey Thompson on September 11th, 2006

After Katrina, New Orleans even a year later is still fighting to return to its full glory. The food capital of the south, New Orleans is know for fine food and launching the careers of many famous chefs, such as FoodTV’s Emeril Lagasse, who is basically a food mega star and the top celeb chef on TV. So, I was sad to read the following article posted by KRT Wire. I hope most of it is not true:

But mere mention of two of the city’s highest-profile exports - Emeril Lagasse and Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse - still draws venom from New Orleanians who feel scorned and abandoned.

The Ruth’s Chris chain, which laid its roots in New Orleans in 1965, moved its headquarters to Florida within a week after the storm. Its original Broad Street location, behind which founder Ruth Fertel lived until she died in 2002, is closed for good.

For superchef Emeril Lagasse, meanwhile, Katrina’s aftermath was also anything but happy, happy, happy. The most famous TV chef in the world - and most certainly Louisiana’s best-known citizen - was criticized for quickly firing employees at his New Orleans corporate office.

He was also taken to task in a commentary titled “Where’s Emeril?” by Times-Picayune restaurant writer Brett Anderson for failing to even visit the city where he owns three restaurants until months after the storm. The Bam! chef told Anderson that he was preoccupied with a national book tour for his 11th cookbook.

New Orleanians were nonplussed.

“That Lagasse, one of popular culture’s great media masters, took a pass on the chance to put his own mega-celebrity to good use at such an unprecedented moment,” Anderson wrote, “is just one of the many post-Katrina mysteries.”

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