Beausoleil Chef and Co-Owner Nathan Gresham

Fish topped with cream sauce is standard fare in South Louisiana restaurants, but steamy temperatures have inspired Beausoleil Chef Co-owner Nathan Gresham to reconsider how to crown his fresh fish this summer. Deviating from the region’s emblematic crab beurre blanc and crawfish cream, Gresham adorns daily deliveries of Gulf fish with cold, textured salads. Specials like pan sautéed trout, escolar or mahi mahi are topped with a sweet, tangy amalgam of caramelized fennel, grilled artichokes and fresh crabmeat. And seared Gulf tuna is served on a puddle of green onion aioli and finished with shaved Brussels sprout slaw. The vegetable’s characteristic bitterness is tamed by Gresham’s honey lemon vinaigrette.

Gresham opened Beausoleil in 2010 with business partner Jeff Conaway, but his kitchen career began well before his decision to launch an inventive new eatery. Nearly six years of working in hotels and restaurants at Yellowstone National Park and Steamboat Springs, Colo., refined his interest and craft. In Colorado, he apprenticed with a French master butcher, who gave Gresham an intense appreciation for charcuterie, reflected on Beausoleil’s menu. The restaurant’s fried oyster salad is topped with homemade duck prosciutto, which Gresham makes by wet-brining a duck breast, smoking it lightly, and then hanging it in cheesecloth for about a week.

His culinary mentors in Colorado encouraged Gresham to attend culinary school, so after applying at several around the country, he decided on the Louisiana Culinary Institute in Baton Rouge. It wasn’t far from family in his native Mississippi. After LCI, he worked at Galatoire’s Bistro under Chef Brian Landry, today the head chef of the Louisiana Seafood Marketing Board. He also met Conway, with whom he opened Beausoleil. “We wanted to put something a little different here,” says Gresham, a regular Red Stick Farmers Market patron who defines his cuisine as refined comfort food. “It was like Baton Rouge was missing something. Now it’s really excited to see a lot interesting things going on.”