NEW ORLEANS | Just two days after Hurricane Katrina barreled into New Orleans, chef John Besh, an ex-Marine who served in Kuwait and fought in Desert Storm, was already tapping his national network of military buddies to marshal resources &mdash; from propane tanks to red beans and rice &mdash; to feed workers, refugees and evacuees. </p><p>&ldquo;Everything is under water. Everybody&rsquo;s life is upside down. The world is coming to an end. The sky is falling. I mean, it was one of those chaotic situations you only see in combat, and here it is in my city,&rdquo; Besh recalled in an interview at Restaurant August, his flagship restaurant and one of the first to reopen after the storm.</p><p>Katrina thrust Besh and other chefs into the role of first responders. Those who lived through the painful and frustrating aftermath say it is impossible to overestimate the importance the food and hospitality industry played in the earliest recovery efforts. Four years after the storm, an army of chefs, urban farmers and community activists continues to painstakingly rebuild the fisheries, farms and neighborhood food systems.</p><p> &ldquo;I figured I might lose the restaurant, but God is calling me to help people in any way I can,&rdquo; said Besh, a New Orleans native. &ldquo;Not only did I feel that way &hellip; other chefs and staff felt that way. That is the only reason we&rsquo;re here today, thriving.&rdquo;</p><p>Located in a historic, four-story French-Creole building at the corner of Tchoupitoulas and Gravier streets in the central business district, August features elegant yet innovative contemporary French cuisine based on locally grown ingredients. </p><p>A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Besh had earned a laundry list of prestigious culinary awards, from scoring a victory for andouille sausage in his match-up with Mario Batali on &ldquo;Iron Chef America&rdquo; to a coveted James Beard Award for best chef of the Southeast.</p><p>But Katrina gave a new focus to his culinary mission.</p><p>&ldquo;I served red beans and rice to this cat, and he says, &lsquo;This is nothing like my mama&rsquo;s!&rsquo;&ensp;&rdquo; Besh recalled. &ldquo;I started thinking, &lsquo;Oh, my gosh!&rsquo; Even in this time of turmoil and strife, we share this common thread. All of us &mdash; white, black, rich, poor, red, yellow. And that common thread of food is nothing more than an expression of a culture that only exists here.&rdquo;</p><p>Besh has rewarded employees who stood by him after the storm by helping them open and run their own restaurants, including L&uuml;ke, a brasserie in the grand New Orleans tradition. He has pitched in to get other venerated culinary landmarks, such as Willie Mae&rsquo;s Scotch House, up and running. He has joined forces with Vietnamese farmers with a guarantee he will buy whatever they grow. He has even been tapped by Louisiana&rsquo;s lieutenant governor to prepare meals for the media.</p><p>Most recently, he hit the road to promote &ldquo;My New Orleans: The Cookbook,&rdquo; a lavish tome of 200 recipes, memoirs and photos published by Kansas City-based Andrews McMeel. One week after its release, the cookbook is already in its second printing. </p><p>&ldquo;I had the desire to document and preserve some of the good stuff,&rdquo; said Besh, who swung through Kansas City recently as part of a nine-city tour. &ldquo;What we have is a national treasure. We have something really unique here: the only indigenous urban cuisine in the country. So I think the important thing for me to do is to make the argument that we all own this.&rdquo;