-Funding for "The Dooky Chase Kitchen: Leah's Legacy" was provided by the... -The guiding principle that Chef Leah Chase lived by was pray, work, and do for others -- rules for life that she learned from her father.

Her commitment to community service is shared by all the members of the Chase family, who volunteer for nonprofit events, contributing dishes in support of organizations that help the people of New Orleans.

This time, chefs Dook and Zoe Chase carry on Chef Leah's legacy with three stellar dishes that have graced charity events through the years.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Chef Dook serves this cornbread dressing to thousands at an annual Thanksgiving community dinner hosted by the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office.

-Now we're talking about the foundation not only of Dooky Chase, but many of all our lives growing up.

We're talking about those three words -- work, pray, and do for others.

And when you talk about doing for others, this brings me back to an event that we do here in New Orleans.

We go out there and we feed people throughout the city for Thanksgiving holiday.

And this cornbread dressing is part of that staple.

We have a plate with cornbread dressing, turkey, and sweet potatoes.

And we'll get started.

As you can see, I have my ground beef here.

And then this is the opened casings of that chaurice sausage that we use here in New Orleans, that hot sausage, has the cayenne pepper and the red pepper flakes.

We'll get started by just melting a little butter in this pot here.

And I'm not gonna put too much butter, again, 'cause when you think about this chaurice sausage, it has that fat in it, right?

It's that pork shoulder that has a lot of fat that's already in it.

We're just gonna add that butter so it doesn't stick to our pot.

And what you want to do here is you just want to start to brown this chaurice sausage in this pot.

♪ And what you want to do... You're not looking to really cook this all the way, 'cause, of course, you still have to add in your vegetables, your onions, your bell peppers, and your garlic.

But you want to brown it, right?

You want to sear in and get that good flavor coming out from this.

I haven't seasoned this yet.

Right?

It's just the pork and the ground beef.

I'm just looking to brown this meat and then I'll start to build in that flavor.

My grandmother, I tell you, it would always be a saying that as many people that we would serve here, she would just go out and feed so many people.

And that was her key -- doing for others.

You talk about the UNCF Gala, you talk about the Chefs' Charity event that we would feed over 1,500 people at the convention center.

Of course, for Thanksgiving, working with our chef, we would feed about 5,000 families here in New Orleans.

But that's who she was.

That's really what created the foundation of what we do and what we continue to do.

So, you can see my meat is browned.

It's not all the way cooked, but it's right where I want it to be.

I'll start by grabbing our onions.

♪ Our bell pepper.

And our celery.

And it's just like any dressing that you're making, right?

We're gonna have those vegetables come in.

And you can see you're cooking that down.

Now, the key is, you see a little liquid here.

You want it to be a little more liquidy, right?

You want it to be wet, but not too wet, so I'm gonna add a little more butter to this.

So, add that butter here.

And while I added that butter in here, my bell peppers and my onions and my celery, they're starting to kind of wilt down and get translucent.

Now is the perfect time for me to add my garlic.

So, add a little bit of garlic.

And if you're like me, I love a lot of garlic, so I'll put that in.

And then this is the part where we start to season, right?

So, we'll have a little salt.

I have a little black pepper.

And I have a little cayenne pepper.

I'm gonna put just a dab 'cause, again, I have that chaurice sausage, right?

That chaurice sausage is our hot sausage.

And the last thing we'll add to this seasoning-wise is a little dried thyme leaves.

And we'll let that go around.

And you can see, though, that vegetable is starting to cook.

And while that's doing it, we'll talk about this cornbread that we have here.

So, we love a savory cornbread here, but a sweet cornbread is just as good.

What we do is you can bake it off, let it cool, and you'll crumble it.

The other great thing is, if you already have cornbread made, this is a perfect dish for that next day as a side.

Right?

And it's simple.

You know, you can have your kids do it, you can do it.

You just get in there and you start to break it up.

But this is all that you're looking for.

Well, that's together.

We'll come back here and you can see my seasoning is starting to wilt down.

The onions and the garlic is cooking through.

And before I add that cornbread, I want to taste to make sure of my seasoning.

Mmm.

That's right where you want it to be, right?

This is the point where we'll add that cornbread in.

And if you see any clumps still in here, before you add that cornbread, you want to start to kind of just break them up a little bit.

I'll take this, and we'll start to add our cornbread in.

And not all at once, right?

'Cause we may not use all this cornbread.

Grab that pan and we'll just start to work it in.

And you can see, just like bread, when that gets wet, it just starts to pick up all that flavor and dive right on in and starts to not only bring it together, but really just tighten it up.

And, oh, my goodness, if you can smell this, once you add that cornbread, you're already thinking Thanksgiving.

You know, I'm already thinking it's coming around and we'll work with the sheriff again, and we're cooking kettles upon kettles and just feeding 5,000 families a good Thanksgiving meal.

And that's what this is all about.

That's what cooking is all about, right?

It's bringing people together, servicing community.

That's why we love to do what we do.

So, you can see that cornbread is starting to just mesh right on in, right?

And that's what we're looking for.

It picked up all that water, right, as we talked about wet.

That's what bread does.

See, we're drying it out.

It's all that flavor and those juices are now just in that cornbread.

And we'll put it in the oven for about 350 degrees.

To really tie it together, we beat one egg and we mix that egg in, right?

I'll take it off the heat.

I'll mix that egg right on in.

Oh.

And that really just binds it together for us.

And just like anything you put in the oven, before it goes in, you taste it.

That's how it's gonna taste, right?

The oven's not gonna add any seasoning to it.

Mmm.

Spot-on.

That's exactly how I want it to taste.

Oh, man.

This brings me back to Thanksgiving.

This is where we want it.

I'mma put it in a 350-degree oven for 20 minutes.

We'll pull it right back out and be ready to serve.

I'll clean all this up.

So, now we're out of the oven, and this is just a beautiful sight.

I mean... Oh, look at this.

And this is what you're looking for, right?

That consistency.

I see cornbread, I see meat, I see my vegetables, right?

I don't see an abundance of either one.

They all marrying together.

And that's what we're looking for.

This dish, you serve this during Thanksgiving time with your turkey and your sweet potatoes, and we're going out with the sheriffs and feeding our community.

This is what it's all about.

This is what my grandmother was all about.

This is what she taught us, and I'm happy to continue that legacy.

-For her generosity, Chef Leah Chase received many accolades, including a Times-Picayune Loving Cup.

Ashton Phelps, the newspaper's publisher, said, "If Leah Chase were the average citizen, Louisiana would be a dream state."

-Giving back has always been a mainstay of my family, and it's been from generations and that's been passed down.

You know, I've been working with my grandmother on many of her community service events, and she brought me there, I think, just to show that this is what we do, this is what we're all about.

-You had to have some sweat equity into whatever the cause was.

You couldn't simply just write a check.

That was too easy, right?

So, Grandmother said, "No.

What else are you gonna do?"

So, volunteering in whatever sense, whatever it was, you were gonna give yourself of service.

-This roasted beet salad with candied pecans has been a perfect starter for charity events.

-Alright, so now we're gonna make my grandmother's favorite, a roasted beet salad.

So, we have our beets here that I've cooked in a 400-degree oven for about 40, 45 minutes.

And so, what you're gonna do is you're gonna put your beets in there and you're gonna add a little water at the bottom and you're gonna cover it with foil and let that go for about 45 minutes.

So, I already chopped up my red beets, so I'mma chop up my yellow beets.

And it's so easy to peel once they come out that oven.

So, we're gonna peel them.

And it can get a little messy.

And we're gonna just cube them up... ♪ ...into just some rough-chop cubes.

♪ Now that our beets are cut, we're gonna start on our beet marinade.

So, our marinade is a little bit of olive oil... ...a little bit of apple cider vinegar.

And you could also use, like, red wine vinegar, some white distilled vinegar.

A little bit of sugar.

And some salt and pepper.

♪ And we'll just stir that up.

♪ Give it a little taste.

Perfect.

A little more salt.

Now we'll add our marinade to our red and yellow beets.

And you don't want to mix your red and yellow beets, because the red beets are so powerful with their color that they'll dye our yellow beets, and we want that yellow color in our salad.

To our marinade, we'll add some sliced red onion.

And we'll go ahead and give that a good mix.

♪ ♪ Alright, now it's time to build our salad.

So, for our lettuce today, we have some romaine.

And you could use arugula, kale -- you know, any lettuce that you like.

Also, we have some spring mix to add on top for a little color.

And we're gonna add some candied pecans.

And this is so simple.

Just a little bit of sugar and some water on the stove.

Let that reduce, fold in your pecans.

You can also fold in some rosemary to give it a good kick.

Let that reduce all down, put it on a sheet pan, and it's done.

We have some goat cheese.

You could also use blue cheese, feta cheese, any cheese you like.

And now for our main star -- our beets.

Just look how delicious.

And I like to add a little more goat cheese on top.

A splash of pecans.

And I have some vinaigrette, some garlic vinaigrette.

You could do any dressing you want.

It really doesn't matter.

But this is a beautiful salad.

So, when we do our charity events, different chefs will have a choice to do the salad, the entree.

And any time we get a chance to do a salad, we're gonna make this roasted beet.

You know, you got your red onion, your goat cheese, your dressing, your pecans.

It's just a beautiful salad, aesthetically pleasing, and it's delicious.

-Through the Dooky Chase Foundation, the younger members of the Chase family carry on the mission of Chef Leah Chase and her husband, Edgar "Dooky" Chase Jr., to make a positive difference in New Orleans.

-We're about service to community.

So, she would go and cook for Chefs' Charity, she would go and cook for this event, she would go and cook for the UNCF, and I would always be a tagalong.

And you see that now as when I go and cook, I'm bringing along the next generation to showcase that this is the foundation of who we are.

-We're not only serving people here, but we have a nonprofit that we give and we give scholarships to, we support programs that support culinary arts or musicians or artistry -- the things that my grandparents loved.

So, to make sure their legacy and they continue to support the community outside of these walls.

-Brimming with blue crab meat, this corn and crab bisque was a favorite soup course at Chefs' Charity fundraisers.

-As we continue to do for others, this is one of those dishes that I remember was the first time I was able to tag along to one of these big chef events with my grandmother.

And we had the soup course, and there was the great corn and crab bisque that she made.

And I just love smelling it, love tasting it.

All these beautiful local ingredients that we have here in Louisiana, the blue crab topping it off, with some corn and that lump crabmeat.

So, Zoe, go right on ahead and let's get started with this corn and crab bisque.

-Alright.

So, to our skillet on a medium heat, we'll add some oil.

And we'll also add a couple of cubes of butter.

And what we're gonna do is we're gonna sauté our crabs first, and that's gonna give our soup a great flavor.

So, we'll add our crabs.

And you only want to cook this for about six minutes.

-Growing up and doing all these events, you know, my grandmother started to get all these awards, and she was a very, very humble person, right?

And I can remember one award was the Loving Cup award, and that's one of those awards that's really at the high end of a person being recognized for their service to the community.

And when she found out that she won it, oh, man, she was just so excited.

But it was also that part that she would always say after she left any of these award shows that "now I have to live for X amount of years 'cause I have to pay my community back," right?

-So, now you see this beautiful, deep orange color.

That's what we're looking for.

And we're almost finished.

This is what we're looking for, and we know we're ready to pull them out.

So, I'll start to pull them out.

-And this is what we call flavoring that oil, right?

Flavoring that butter.

Now it has that great crab stock flavor when you go to build upon that roux.

And you can see even the tint of that oil change, right, as it sautéed those crabs.

-Now we'll turn our heat down because we're gonna start our roux.

-It's already picking up that crab flavor, that smell.

I mean, you cook with your nose first.

And this, I can smell it.

I can know right where we going.

-Alright, we'll add a little bit of flour and we'll stir that.

We aren't gonna take our roux too far, because we still want it to be light because our corn and crab soup is, you know, a lighter-colored soup.

Alright, now it's time to add our vegetables.

So, we'll add our onion.

We'll add our celery.

We'll add some green bell pepper.

And, of course, some garlic.

We want to let the vegetables cook in the roux for about two minutes to let them get soft, and then we'll add our crab stock.

And if you don't have crab stock, you could do seafood stock.

Um, shrimp stock would be just as great.

Alright.

We'll add some of our crab stock.

♪ And a little bit of water.

♪ Now we can season.

We'll season with some cayenne pepper.

Some salt.

Some pepper.

Some ground thyme.

So, we use our ground thyme because the fresh thyme has, you know, the specks in them and we don't want that in our soup.

I also added a little paprika to it as well.

-So, a lot of times when we cook light-color... whether it's soup or it's lima beans or anything that has that light color, we tend to go to ground thyme because you don't want those thyme leaves to show up and someone who's not familiar with dried thyme to question what that is in the soup, right?

So, any time you have that light-color soup or stock or beans, you want to use that ground dried thyme in there.

You know, growing up in this restaurant and under my grandmother, you learned so much not about just the restaurant, but you learned about life and how to treat people and how to respect people and how to really have a love for all people, and what service for community means, right?

It's not just about serving the people the best that we can here in Dooky Chase.

It's about going beyond that, going outside of this restaurant and making sure everybody in this area has what they need.

And if they don't, how can we play a little role in there?

-Now we can add our corn.

♪ We'll stir our corn around.

And it's smelling so great.

I want to give it a little taste to see where our seasoning is at.

-I'mma dive in with you.

-Mmm.

So good.

-And I want you to notice the consistency of this dish, right?

It's not finished, because we have to add that heavy cream into it, so it's not as thick as we want it to be just yet, but it will get there.

-But you see how it's still, you know, sticking to the spoon a little bit.

That's a perfect consistency.

Alright.

Now that we're at a boil, we'll turn it down a little so we could stay at a nice simmer.

We'll add our crabmeat.

♪ And we'll add back our crabs.

-Then we have beautiful lump crabmeat.

But if you have claw crabmeat, that certainly works fine just in here in this soup.

-Alright.

Now I think we're ready to fold in our heavy cream.

We'll just add a little bit at first.

And now add a little bit more.

Wow.

Soup looks beautiful.

-And as you know, when you add in things, right, we're gonna give it one last taste.

We added that cream.

We just want to make sure that flavor is still right where we want it to be.

♪ -Mmm.

-Mmm.

-So good.

-That's spot-on, Zoe.

-Now that our soup is done, we're ready to plate.

So, we're gonna turn our heat down.

We gotta make sure we get a bunch of crabs in here 'cause that's the star.

♪ ♪ Oh, wow.

This looks so good.

-Yeah, it looks wonderful.

-Green onion.

And a little parsley.

-This is a dish that we serve at many charity events just to show our appreciation for those who help support our community.

And we always strive to live up to that motto that my grandmother had from her father -- work, pray, and do for others.

-Chef Leah Chase spent a lifetime uplifting the community and building bridges through food.

For more meals that bring people together, join the Chase family next time on "The Dooky Chase Kitchen: Leah's Legacy."

-Leah Chase's iconic book, "The Dooky Chase Cookbook," has been updated and includes all-new recipes from the series you're watching.

The cookbook is available for $27.95, plus shipping and handling.

To order, please call 1-866-388-0834 or order online at wyes.org.

-She wanted to make sure everyone's experience at the restaurant was personalized, and she remembered every detail.

She remembered everyone's favorite drink, everyone's favorite dish, and what their guests enjoyed or not.

-When Nat King Cole came or when I was certainly here when the Jackson Five would come, but whoever would come, she would know, my mother, Chef Leah Chase would know what their favorite meal would be.

Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, whomever.

And she would make sure that she had that ready for them.

This is what she did, but she would do that for our everyday customers.

-Her natural... Everything about her and this business was hard work, but the things that were wonderful about it were just natural to her, from the hospitality to people to the food she cooked, and I'm glad of that.

-For more information about "The Dooky Chase Kitchen: Leah's Legacy," visit... Funding for "The Dooky Chase Kitchen: Leah's Legacy" was provided by the...