Harahan

The fact that the parking lot is surfaced with oyster shells should tell you something. It's the first of many impressions that this is an old-style, close-to-the-water combination seafood market and cafe. It's like the joints and the people you see after driving a hundred miles into the Louisiana wetlands, except that it's in Harahan, which is only slightly remote from the city. All the freshness and sense of place that this implies are indeed borne out in the cooking.

French Quarter

New Orleans East

Walker's appeared on Hayne Boulevard so quickly after Katrina that it was a godsend to the people in its neighborhood. Almost everything in New Orleans East was destroyed, but Walker's building is right up on the lakefront and free of major flooding. And the supply of customers was infinite, what with all those people in the extended neighborhood with lots of work and few sources of food and drink.