John Besh vanished from public eye after scandal. Now he’s back, opening new restaurant.

A new riverfront restaurant now taking shape in downtown New Orleans is signaling a more public role for the chef behind it, John Besh, nearly seven years after a sexual misconduct scandal saw him all but vanish from the scene.

Besh was widely regarded as the leading chef in New Orleans before sexual harassment complaints rocked his company in 2017. He swiftly stepped down from operating the business, part of a raft of changes for the restaurant group, which was renamed BRG Hospitality at that time.

But now Besh is becoming a more visible presence as the enterprise embarks on a major project, a Louisiana seafood restaurant in Spanish Plaza to be called Delacroix Fish Camp & Bar.

While Besh has kept a low profile since 2017, he has remained a partner in BRG, which he co-founded as Besh Restaurant Group with Octavio Mantilla in 2005.

With the new riverfront restaurant in the works, he is speaking publicly about his role.

“Right now, I want to continue to pursue teaching and inspiring young chefs and managers in hospitality,” Besh said in an interview. “This is what I want to focus on in this new chapter, that’s where my talents and passion lie.”

Asked if he would call his latest move a run at a comeback, Besh instead characterized it as what he needs to do at his company to recover from the pandemic.

“Really, all I want to do is put my head down and work, and push forward with what we’ve always done, and make a difference in this little part of the world we live in here,” he said.

What happened

Besh, a 56-year-old married father of four, is a Slidell native whose star began rising through the 1990s, and with the opening of his upscale flagship Restaurant August in 2001. He and Mantilla began expanding in the post-Katrina rebuilding era, and their company emerged as a leading voice for modern New Orleans food and hospitality.

Besh took on a high-profile role in the media, from cookbooks to cooking shows and Food Network appearances. Besh restaurants and their chefs became magnets for James Beard Award recognition and other accolades.

Then, in October 2017, The Times-Picayune published a story by former restaurant writer Brett Anderson alleging sexual harassment within the company, the result of an eight-month investigation. Women quoted in the report described a toxic work environment where harassment went unchecked, and there were allegations against Besh himself.

The issues compelled a number of women to leave their jobs, and several filed complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Two days after the story broke, Besh stepped down as the head of his company. He issued a statement expressing regret for his actions and said he aimed to rebuild his marriage and apologize to anyone “who has worked for me who found my behavior as unacceptable as I do.”

BRG promoted one of its managers, Shannon White, to be CEO, and ushered in new human resources systems and training. One of the revelations of the investigation was that while the restaurant company had grown to more than 1,000 employees, it did not have a human resources department until shortly before the report was published.

The #MeToo movement

The investigation provoked widespread discussion about sexism and sexual harassment in the restaurant business at a time when the #MeToo movement was bringing the issue to the forefront in many industries. Besh was an early and prominent example of a public figure who faced allegations and stepped away from public life.

Others from that time have attempted comebacks, notably Mario Batali, the mega-celebrity chef. Batali eventually sold his restaurants and remained out of view, though late last year he began posting cooking videos and other content to his Instagram account.

How Besh’s reemergence will land remains to be seen, but some of those closest to the issue raised in 2017 did not welcome the news.

“Am I surprised by John Besh trying to creep back into the public eye and do his redemption tour? Sadly no. More disgusted and disappointed,” said Lindsey Reynolds, a former Besh Restaurant Group employee.

She sees it as an effort to sweep bad behavior under the rug, and blamed “the New Orleans good ole’ boys club” and the local media for its coverage of BRG restaurants.

Besh’s role now

At BRG, White remains CEO and continues to run the day-to-day operations, while Besh has become more engaged at the restaurants.

For about a year now, he has worked primarily with culinary staff behind the scenes, especially at Luke and Restaurant August. He says this is what the company needs as new projects arise, like Delacroix. He says he is not seeking to regain the spotlight.

Mantilla said Besh’s main role today is “to teach and inspire.”

“We have a very good team that’s been with us since the company started. They still fight the daily battles with us,” Manilla said. “That’s why we’re doing this, to make opportunities for people on our team. We are hitting the restaurants, talking with team members about the vision, and getting them on board.”

Changes in the aftermath

Besh’s decision to step down from company leadership was one of many impacts of the sexual harassment reports. One restaurant in the group closed almost immediately, Besh Steak, inside what was then Harrah’s Casino. Others would later be spun off as different partners formed new companies to buy out BRG, including the downtown Mexican restaurant Johnny Sanchez and Besh’s one-time hotel restaurant division.

The most high-profile change came in the split from Alon Shaya, the chef who came to fame at BRG’s Italian restaurant Domenica and then at the modern Israeli restaurant Shaya. Besh and Shaya landed in federal court in a fight over that restaurant’s name. The case was settled with BRG keeping the name. Alon Shaya went on to open restaurants under his own new company, including Saba and Miss River in New Orleans.

BRG continued to open restaurants, starting with the Cajun restaurant Eunice in Houston in 2018. Two subsequent new restaurants in New Orleans closed, Warbucks (first opened in 2018) and Cho Thai (which took over the Warbucks address in 2020).

The company has been in growth mode more recently, opening a Lakeview location for its Pizza Domenica concept in 2022 (an earlier Mid-City location would later close) and Tavi, a sibling restaurant to Shaya, which opened in Covington in 2023. That same year it acquired the Larder deli in Metairie.

BRG now runs 10 restaurants. In addition to Delacroix, the company has another Covington restaurant in the works in a development replacing the former Star Theater.