METAIRIE, LA — In the days after the 9/11 attacks on New York City in 2001, a group of volunteers made a name for themselves by feeding first responders at the collapsed World Trade Center site.
They were known as the Gumbo Krewe, and the team went on to feed people at other emergencies as well as fundraisers. Now, one of the group’s founders would like to feed you.
“We opened a restaurant right in the middle of a pandemic. Only the Gumbo Krewe could pull that off,” Shawn Bradley told WGNO. Bradley is the owner of the restaurant and one of the original founders of the group.
The Gumbo Krewe Restaurant is located on West Esplanade in Metairie. Bradley says that he was able to keep the business running early in the pandemic by providing delivery and drive through service.
Now he’s hoping people will come sample some of the food that made the group so well known nearly 20 years ago. Bradley also has another attraction for visitors, and iron cross that was cut from the steel at the collapsed World Trade Center site in New York and given to him by a welder.
For more on the cross and the group’s work to help others, click on the video at the top of this story.
Gumbo Krewe’s Shawn Bradley 
Gumbo Krewe Restaurant on West Esplanade in Metairie 
Serves some of the same gumbo as Bradley has around the country 
Bradley’s restaurant survived during the height of the pandemic by providing drive through and delivery service 
Customers can see this iron cross that was cut from steel at the World Trade Center site in New York after 9/11
