Revisiting restaurants I covered years ago to see what’s changed, or what’s deliciously stayed the same.
Always hungry for affordable experiences and new flavors to share, I pulled off the dazzling feat of dining at well over a thousand New Orleans restaurants over the years. It’s a lifetime achievement I’ll happily brag about, and now, at last, I have that opportunity.
On the corner of Chartres and Gallier streets stands Elizabeth’s Restaurant, a tall, two-story building painted with vintage signage advertising bygone local products Regal Beer and almond-flavored soft drink Dr. Nut, and touting “Fresh Seafood Daily.” In 1998, South Carolina-born chef Heidi Trull opened the Bywater neighborhood spot with the intention of serving “real food done real good” at an affordable price in a laid-back, unpretentious atmosphere.
After graduating from the culinary arts school at Johnson and Wales in Charleston, Trull honed her craft working in fine dining kitchens such as the Ritz Carlton in St. Louis, Elizabeth on 37th in Savannah, and Emeril Lagasse’s flagship restaurant Emeril’s NOLA. Inspired to open her own place, she wanted to offer a restaurant for everyone, serving staple local dishes like grits and grillades, po-boys and old-fashioned calas all at a budget-friendly price. Elizabeth’s began as a closely-guarded secret amongst hungry locals, but grew to be a wildly successful restaurant as more and more savvy visitors discovered the Bywater gem.
In the spring of 2005, Trull decided to start a family and sold Elizabeth’s to innkeepers Floyd McLamb and Stuart Anthony. The duo renovated the building’s unused second story, adding another dining room and bar, but their future plans for the restaurant were unrealized when Hurricane Katrina struck and devastated the city.
Today Elizabeth’s is owned by Chef Bryon Peck, a graduate of the California Culinary Institute who started working with Heidi Trull at the neighborhood gem almost since its inception. To this day Peck still honors Trull’s vision, retaining numerous dishes from the original menu from their renowned praline bacon to the Bayou Breakfast with fried catfish and eggs.
In my first year writing Where Y’at’s $15 & Under column nearly 14 years ago, I waxed poetic about “The Blessed Biscuit,” a Southern breakfast staple often found on my family’s kitchen table. Though it’s doubtful any restaurant will ever be able to replicate the soft, flaky biscuits made with a lifetime of skill and big handfuls of love by my Great Aunt Edie, the buttermilk biscuits served with a savory sausage gravy at Elizabeth’s certainly came close.
In successive visits over a decade ago, we explored over half the menu, delighting in a cornbread waffle piled high with sweet potato hash pan fried with duck confit and housemade pepper jelly; gobbling a “redneck” version of eggs benedict with poached eggs and hollandaise resting atop crisply battered and fried green tomatoes; and a fully dressed fried oyster po-boy served with sweet potato fries.
As it is so often said “the only constant in life is change,” and things have certainly changed at Elizabeth’s over the years. The exterior has acquired heavier decoration, with colorful signage touting everything from Elizabeth’s signature praline bacon (which still rocks, by the way) and our city’s famed lost bread a.k.a. pain perdu to red beans and rice. In fact, the “Elizabeth’s” sign hanging above the front door has been re-lettered with larger print that includes the restaurant’s iconic slogan and (for a while) a swinging bewinged piglet.
The restaurant had also eliminated their dinner menu almost entirely. However, luckily, they brought back their dinner, with the addition of happy hour, on September 25, making their new Thursday, Friday, and Saturday hours 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Additionally, they are open every day of the week for breakfast and lunch from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Favorite menu items from the past are often resurrected as specials handwritten on a large chalkboard that changes regularly. Recent comebacks include a Creole version of British staple bubble and squeak made with sauteed cabbage, Louisiana shrimp and hog jowls topped with poached eggs and hollandaise.
Chef Peck will also use the chalkboard specials to introduce new flavors to Elizabethans (dyed-in-the-wool regulars) like housemade potato chips with blue cheese sauce, shrimp ceviche with a jalapeno lime broth and a crawfish and shrimp-stacked fried green tomatoes topped off with a fried soft shell crab.
While change is always invigorating, there’s a lot to be said for what stays the same. Elizabeth’s still serves fried chicken livers with pepper jelly, and old fashioned calas – our city’s beloved (and almost lost) fried rice fritters – drizzled with Steen’s Cane Syrup, items that harken back to Chef Trull’s original menu.
The restaurant remains both a neighborhood gem and touristy brunch hotspot where visitors sit at mismatched tables draped in gaudy, colorful tablecloths – decor all too apropos for maw-maw’s kitchen – sipping Pimm’s Cups or Pineapple Jalapeño margaritas from plastic tumblers and sharing plates of fried boudin balls or pecan pie.
Elizabeth’s has staked a claim in the hearts of locals and visitors, a restaurant that’s survived Hurricane Katrina as well as the pandemic shutdowns, and still serving “real food, done real good” at blessedly affordable prices. It’s up to us to ensure the landmark Bywater restaurant remains part of our cityscape for as long as possible, so go get you some while the getting’s still good!
*Header photo was taken in April 2011
*Article was published in the October 2025 issue of Where Y’at Magazine
