Introducing the interesting and insightful Dwynesha Lavigne
We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Dwynesha Lavigne. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Dwynesha below.
Hi Dwynesha, thanks for joining us today. Let’s start with important influences in our lives. Is there a historical figure you look up to? One of the historical figures I look up to is Chef Lena Richard. I was first introduced to Chef Richard in 2017 by Elizabeth Williams founder of The Southern Food and Beverage Museum. At our introduction Richard had been deceased for over 65 years. Doing research and speaking with historians I tried to find out as much information about her as I could. Looking at how successful she was over her short lifetime was nothing but impressive. Lena Richard was a chef, cookbook author, restaurant and eatery owner, frozen food entrepreneur, and hosted the first cooking segments live on television from New Orleans, Louisiana. Chef Lena has taught me resilience, dedication, determination, and grit. Lena Richard was a black woman who loved food, her family, her community and she grew up in New Orleans just like me. The greatest heights of her career all happened during segregation and in the Jim Crow South. Her determination has truly been an inspiration in my life and has kept me moving forward to change history and the legacy I will leave for the next Black women not just here in New Orleans but in the world.
Other News
News
Women entrepreneurs: Continuing a legacy, creating new opportunities
March 22, 2023
By last year, Chef Dwynesha “Dee” Lavigne, a lifelong cook, was already a well-established culinary presence in New Orleans. She had worked in the industry for years, owned a pastry business and hosted a periodic cooking segment on WWL-TV.
News
Chef Dee Lavigne is following in Chef Lena Richard's footsteps
December 22, 2022
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.
News
Meet the chef behind NOLAs’ African American-owned cooking school
September 26, 2022
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.
News
The Black Creole Chef Who Paved the Way for Food TV
May 19, 2022
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.
