Those who dine at Miss Shirley’s Chinese Restaurant for the first time don’t need an introduction to know who Shirley Lee is.
She stands only slightly taller than the bar tables inside her New Orleans restaurant. Regulars bend down to hug her; children reach up. Few kids leave without an extra powdered beignet or a lollipop from her stash beneath the register. Between conversations, she shuffles into the kitchen in a striped apron, glasses perched atop her head, to fold dumplings and or plate generous portions.
Lee does not stop moving. She hasn’t for more than 50 years…