Elizabeth Kettenring came to New Orleans from Germany in 1853.  She married Louis Dutreuil and opened a restaurant in the French Quarter in 1863.  After Dutreuil's death, she married Hippolyte Begue and changed the restaurant's name from Dutrey's to Begue's.

Madame Begue served only one meal, a "second breakfast," at 11:00 a.m., a popular time for those who had been at work since before dawn in the Quarter and on the docks.  When tourists came to the city for the Cotton Centennial in 1884, the late breakfast at Madame Begue's became very popular and this is where the concept of "brunch" originated!

Madame Begue was New Orleans’ original celebrity chef. She was first published in 1900 at the cookbook’s title was “Madame Begue’s Recipes of Old New Orleans Creole Cookery.”  
Out of print since 1937, this rare treasure was issued by Pelican Publishing Company in the fall of 2012, with a foreword by Poppy Tooker and updated recipes for the 21st century cook.