By Jeff Thomas
New Orleans is a food town. Part of the draw are the great restaurants where you can grab a delicious and memorable meal. And forever African Americans have been cooking in some of the most well-known restaurants. But there are less than 50 sit down and get a great meal restaurants owned and operated by African Americans. Below are the top 5 (actually 6 restaurants cause there is a tie).
- Dooky Chase This legendary restaurant has served the famous like Martin Luther King, Jr and Barack Obama and everyday folks who want some delicious Creole New Orleans cooking. From the priceless art on the walls to the white table cloths with beautiful chairs, this restaurant is a “you gotta go” choice. From the best fried chicken in New Orleans to the hot and scrumptious peach cobbler, you should go for lunch. Then you can sample the best buffet in America.
- Neyows. This restaurant became so popular that they bought the building next door, tore it down and built their own restaurant. They serve the best hot sausage in town and paired with a huge serving of white beans and rice, you will be completely satisfied when you push away from the table. Also, their charbroiled oysters come hot and savory with a sauce that is creamy and seasoned. The outside bar is fun and lively when the weather permits.
- Morrows. This new, hip and chic spot is a cool hangout in a cool neighborhood with plenty of bars and other venues nearby. Always crowded, prepare to wait for food that is more complementary to the atmosphere than it is a draw. Did that sound like the food is not good? The food is great but the vibe is better. One of the best grilled redfish plates in town. For the young and sexy.
- Barrow’s Catfish. There was a time before Katrina, that you could drive up to the restaurant at any time of the day, walk in and within 5 minutes get a piping hot plate of fresh fried catfish. Cause that’s all they sold. But that restaurant was closed and took nearly 15 years for the children to open in a new beautiful location. The wait is a little longer now, but the catfish is still the best in town. The French fries are unique, thin and a cross between a French fry and a potato chip. The clean new location serves other dishes that are also freshly fried.
- Tie Munch Factory and Willie Mae’s Scotch House. Before winning a James Beard Award and later being named the best fried chicken restaurant in America, Willie Mae’s was just another corner restaurant cranking out delicious food for us fortunate New Orleanians who were aware of it. Now the wait is an hour and the best smothered veal in brown gravy is just an afterthought. Worth the wait, the fried chicken is unusually lightly battered and crispy. Meanwhile, the Munch factory moved a successful restaurant from a lakefront neighborhood to the hot uptown Magazine St. area to attract bigger crowds. The food is still great with a great gumbo and the oysters Gentilly worth the trek uptown or to the new location at the clubhouse on the golf course in Pontchartrain Park.
Enjoy!!!
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of Executive Appraisers Louisiana, an MBE-certified real estate appraisal firm, and EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu
Publisher — Black Source Media
Jeff Thomas
Publisher • Opinion Columnist • Licensed General Contractor • Real Estate Appraiser • New Orleans
Jeff Thomas is the publisher of Black Source Media and one of New Orleans’ most direct voices on civic affairs, economic justice, and Louisiana politics. He writes from the intersection of experience and accountability — as a licensed general contractor,a tech company founder and executive with over 30 years experience, and a businessman who has worked across the city’s civic, media, and construction ecosystems for decades.
His Sunday column covers Louisiana legislative politics, insurance discrimination, housing policy, and the forces shaping Black community life in New Orleans and across the state. Thomas writes in the tradition of Black journalists who hold power accountable without apology — building arguments from data, delivering verdicts from evidence, and speaking to Black New Orleans with the directness the moment demands.
He is also the principal of Executive Appraisers Louisiana, an MBE-certified real estate appraisal firm, and EA Inspection Services, LLC, a government inspection services company. Black Source Media is his platform for the civic conversation New Orleans has needed and too rarely had.
Selected Articles by Jeff Thomas
Black Neighborhoods Pay the Highest Insurance Rates in Louisiana. Here’s What They Don’t Want You to Know.
They Didn’t Yell the N-Word. They Went to Law School, Bided Their Time, and Rewrote the Constitution Instead.
Vappie vs. Morrell: Why Does Justice Look Different in New Orleans?
The State Has the Money. New Orleans East Just Needs Them to Use It.
The Failure of Mitch Landrieu
On your list of Top Five Black restaurants…Cafe Dauphine is one of my favorites.
What about Cafe Dauphine or Lil Dizzy’s?
I am from Baton Rouge. My wife is from Alabama. This will be her first time ever eating in New Orleans – except for fast food. Thanks for the recommendations!
The praline Connection is AWESOME!!!!!!!
This does disservice to other very good reasonable priced restaurants in New Orleans. This article is just like the City’s tourism market always catering to the most known by. I would like to see you do an article on other Black restaurants, as I said whose food is just as good and somewhat better, like Lil Dizzy, Sassafras, Dunbars, and Cafe Dauphine. Maybe you can get a page from Essence black establishments to dine.