Chef Dee Lavigne Is Ready to Take Over New Orleans
2021-04-23
With a pastry business, weekly tv cooking spot, and role as SoFab’s education director, Dee Lavigne is in command of her career.
Like many people who find success from hard work, Dwynesha “Chef Dee” Lavigne says yes first, then figures it out on the back end. It’s how she wound up with her own pastry business Deelightful Desserts; how she landed a regular cooking spot on WWL on Sunday mornings; and it’s why she’s the newly named education director of cooking classes at the Southern Food and Beverage Museum (SoFab) in New Orleans.
Lavigne’s baking comes in all kinds of forms, including Deelightful Bites, mini-cake desserts layered with buttercream frosting in flavors with mood board names like wedding cake and chocolate cloud — all served in Instagram-friendly jars. Her sprinkle-covered vanilla cupcakes are a specialty, as are her pretzel nut brownies and chewy chocolate chip cookies. At SoFab, she’ll be leading classes in baking as well as an introduction to Cajun and Creole cuisine course.
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Chef Dee Lavigne is following in Chef Lena Richard's footsteps
2022-12-22
In February of 2022, Chef Dwynesha “Dee” Lavigne founded Deelightful Roux School of Cooking, following in the footsteps of her heroine, the late Chef Lena Richard. It’s been over eighty years since a Black woman has owned a cooking school in New Orleans, ever since Richard closed hers—the first—to pursue opportunities in New York City in the 1940s.
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Meet the chef behind NOLAs’ African American-owned cooking school
2022-09-26
Chef Dee Lavigne learned to cook at the age of seven. After a brief career in accountancy, she decided to ditch the world of spreadsheets and focus on her true passion: food. Now she runs the first African American-owned cooking school New Orleans has seen in over 80 years, whipping up Cajun and Creole classics for hungry travellers.
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The Black Creole Chef Who Paved the Way for Food TV
2022-05-19
A belated celebration of Lena Richard. In 1949 — more than a decade before Julia Child’s television debut — a boisterous Creole chef put on a cook’s uniform and made history.
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Chef Dee Lavigne Expands The Only Black-Owned Cooking School In New Orleans
2022-05-11
Deelightful Roux School of Cooking is the only African American-owned cooking school taught by a New Orleans native, and her class is a guide to New Orleans’ food culture.
