While most people would relish the thought of having a popular restaurant named in their honor, for Gabrielle Sonnier the reality of growing up in the culinary limelight wasn’t so sweet.
Gabrielle Sonnier was still a toddler in 1992 when her father chef Greg Sonnier and mother and pastry chef Mary Sonnier opened their restaurant blending Cajun cooking with the Creole cuisine for which New Orleans is known on Esplanade Avenue in Bayou Saint John calling it Gabrielle. (It won Eater New Orleans’ 2017 Eater Award for Best Comeback)
“To tell you the truth, I hated that the old restaurant was named after me,” she said. “I didn’t want the attention. I was shy and was forever being asked about it.”
Nor did the restaurant allow for Sonnier to spend much time with her father. Her school schedule and his long stints in the kitchen meant the two rarely overlapped.
Sonnier was an impressionable 16-years old when Hurricane Katrina’s floodwaters destroyed the restaurant. She watched as her parents not only had to overcome that loss, but endure a bitter, public battle in 2007 when they attempted to re-open the restaurant in a reception hall called the Uptowner the family had purchased on Henry Clay Avenue near their home.
Despite having paid $700,000 for a property and business that appeared to be zoned for restaurant use, the Sonniers soon faced opposition from residents citing concerns over parking, noise, and traffic. Others claimed that regardless of the property’s previous designation, the Sonniers had failed to go through the proper channels as a new, full-time business. The Sonniers hired a lawyer and sought answers from the city, only to remain in limbo as officials were either unwilling or unable to clarify the building’s status.
Ultimately the tensions cut too close; among the most vocal opponents were the Sonnier’s neighbors. “That was really tough week,” Sonnier remembers of the days leading up to the public City Council hearing. “Coming home to all those signs in the yards, saying No Gabrielle.” In the end, the Sonniers were denied restaurant status; the Uptowner could function as a catering business only.
Despite all the heartache, something of her parents’ passions must have stuck with Sonnier, as one of her first gigs out of high school was working at Refuel Cafe in the Riverbend. Several years of voluntary exile from New Orleans followed, first at university in Lake Forest, Illinois, and then in Chicago where Sonnier moved and and gained experience working under recent James Beard-winning chef Jimmy Bannos, Jr. at his eclectic restaurant The Purple Pig.
With no reservations, communal tables and waits of up to two hours, Sonnier admits the Pig was a “tough place to work.” But she also felt a sense of community from her fellow workers despite the long days and pressure. “We were close,” she says. “Jimmy treated us like a family of friends.”
Eventually homesickness won out and Sonnier, now an experienced industry worker in her own right, decided to return to New Orleans. For parents Greg and Mary Sonnier the timing felt right. Greg Sonnier had never given up on the dream of re-opening his own place, and while supportive, Mary Sonnier, whose responsibilities had always extended far beyond desserts to encompass much of the organization, found herself ready to pass the torch.
“Dad always wanted to open up another restaurant,” Sonnier says. Despite stints working for others, she sensed her father wouldn’t be satisfied until he was running his own place. Nor was the Uptowner’s business proving consistent. And as long as Gabrielle restaurant operated out of the reception hall, zoning regulations would continue to be a thorn, prohibiting him from what wanted most: To serve regular, sit-down meals.
But finding the right spot continued to elude the Sonniers. When an attempt to open a restaurant across the river in Gretna didn’t pan out, it became yet another setback in a growing list.
And then last year when a space became available on Orleans Avenue in the Treme, the Sonniers rolled up their sleeves and — over the course of a sweaty summer — set about transforming what had been a cigarette and chips corner store into a casual, welcoming restaurant. A small budget meant U-Haul trips across the state to bring back secondhand furniture and appliances. The family debated on what to call the restaurant, ultimately deciding to stick with what they and others knew.
“We kept it quiet,” Sonnier recalls of the weeks leading to the opening. “We didn’t want any distractions. Maybe we also didn’t want to get our hopes up too much. It had been such a long time coming and we’d suffered a lot of setbacks.” Gabrielle was finally reborn, a dozen years after having been claimed by Hurricane Katrina’s floodwaters.
While Gabrielle’s new location in the Treme may seem a radical shift from either the restaurant’s first digs in leafy Bayou Saint John or the Uptowner’s Henry Clay location, Sonnier says they’ve been embraced by their new neighbors who see the restaurant as a positive development.
“Ms. Chase sent three bouquets opening night to congratulate us,” Sonnier says of chef and food icon Leah Chase whose longstanding restaurant, Dooky Chase, stands just one block away. Sonnier notes those first weeks brought no shortage of calls and emails from old customers telling the family how glad they were to have the restaurant back.
Sonnier says she hopes the restaurant’s new incarnation will satisfy a sweet mid-range spot as a sit-down neighborhood restaurant that rises above the typical po-boy corner joints. She also hopes it lacks pretension and remains affordable enough to draw a steady clientele — both regulars from the old Gabrielle, but also new diners eager to sample the restaurant’s swampy, “game-changing” quail gumbo and its beloved, New York Times-worthy duck dish.
“We really had to think about the menu,” she says. “We wanted to make sure that we were still relevant, that we weren’t outdated.” Sonnier notes that true New Orleans spots are increasingly rare in an era when transplant chefs and evolving demographics have created a demand for non-native cuisines. “The food scene has changed a lot since the first restaurant. It’s getting hard to find a real New Orleans-style restaurant — real Cajun food and a reasonable price.”
The result? A menu that mixes “the old with the new.” What hasn’t changed since Gabrielle restaurant first opened: The restaurant still doesn’t have a website or accept internet reservations. Tables must be reserved by telephone or in person; generally, it’s Sonnier who fields those calls.
Sonnier admits her father’s duck — a holdover from the restaurant’s previous incarnation —keeps them in business. However, she points to the savory barbecue shrimp pie with its flaky crust, sweet potato filling, and large saucy, Louisiana shrimp as her personal favorite. “I ate it as a kid, so I’m pretty nostalgic about it.”
Above all, Sonnier emphasizes that Gabrielle is a family establishment. “When people come here, I want them to feel welcome, like they’ve just stepped in for a really good meal at a relative’s house.” Aside from her father in the kitchen, Gabrielle’s little sister Gigi often handles the front door and her fiance Marsh oversees the bar, having left “his dream job” to come work for his in-laws. It’s a familiarity Sonnier believes filters down to the customer.
As for her relationship with her father, re-opening the restaurant has given Gabrielle and Greg Sonnier time and a collaboration they didn’t have when she was young. “We bounce ideas off one another, like how to reconfigure the tables, or staying open for lunch on Easter. We joke that I’m his boss now,” Gabrielle says with a smirk.
“Even your mother says it!” Marsh calls from the bar.
After watching her parents struggle for years, that levity has been hard won. But when asked what it feels like to be the namesake of a restaurant, Gabrielle Sonnier, now a mature woman of 29, has a very different take from the timid girl she once was.
“I’m so proud of my family,” she says. “I think all the tough times make us appreciate what we have now. It would have been really easy for my parents to have given up, but they didn’t. They bounced back from every punch.” She pauses, overcome with emotion, to wipe her eyes. “And they stuck together through all that, for 31 years. It’s a really nice example for Marsh and I. I know they imagine I’ll take this over one day. I’d love that. This is where I want to be. This feels right, like home.”