critic James Ward. He passed away in 2009, but he was there for a long time. We didn't know him personally, but evidently he liked us, because in that piece he said we were the place to eat. Then he did a piece on us for Channel 7 and we got to know him better, and then other local TV stations and food critics starting coming in.Everyone loved the family aspect of it. We were really friendly, and we started building relationships that we still have 35 years later.
But multiples are interesting. For 17 years we had been doing this New Orleans-style food. And then we opened up a flashier place with a larger kitchen. We could do more, but it wasn't a joint like the first. People were like, "Oh, the gumbo's not the same, the turtle soup's not the same." I would be making it, so it was the same thing, but people were saying that it was the second best gumbo in the city.
The people who are the mainstays of the area—who live just blocks away from Wrigley Field—hate baseball season. They hate the Cubs. During the season there's such an influx of people getting drunk and peeing on their lawns, and so they don't stay local to eat, and they're the ones who would have been our regulars. Meanwhile the baseball people just wanted bar food. I had a very reasonable 25-year lease, but I just sold it in January.
And there were many remembrances of my mom. There was this one guy who said, "You know, I brought your mom a Christmas present every year because she was always so warm and made me feel like part of the family." I watched my grandchild running up and down the hallway with my son, and had incredible deja vu, thinking back to me doing that with my son Jimmy. Customers could see the progression of their lives at these tables, and so could we. It's really wild.
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Source: Variety - 🏆 108. / 63 Read more »