Pirate's Cove logo PiratesCovePoBoy.com Pirate's Cove
Since 1972

A Pass Christian po-boy house.

Yellow walls. Friendly faces. The same roast beef. Bread from New Orleans at dawn. That is Pirate's Cove.

Patrick and Mary Keith Rusbridge at Pirate's Cove with a Po-Boy, fries, and Barq's
Family owned

Patrick and Mary Keith Rusbridge

Mary Keith grew up in Pass Christian. Family dinners were Pirate’s Cove. Takeout went to the beach and out on the boat. In 2023 she and Patrick bought the restaurant, trained under the Lamarcas and General Manager David Necaise, and kept the people who already knew how this place works.

The walls are still yellow. The bread still comes from John Gendusa. The gravy is still the reason people order extra fries.

“Food is something that people bond over.”

— Mary Keith Rusbridge

Family at the Pirate's Cove counter on Menge Avenue

Family at the counter on Menge Avenue.

The original Pirate's Cove on the 1300 block of East Beach in Pass Christian
August 17, 1972

1300 block of East Beach.

Pirate’s Cove opened on the 1300 block of East Beach — the old ground of Governor White’s House, which Hurricane Camille had taken. Jimmy Edwards, a real estate developer and coach at St. Paul’s, and Jerald Reed, a former Seabee, owned and ran it.

The restaurant is on Menge Avenue now, one block off the beach. Same name. Same roast beef. Same Gendusa bread. Different lot.

The bread that built the po-boy

John Gendusa Bakery, New Orleans.

In 1922 John Gendusa opened a bakery in New Orleans. By the end of that decade he baked a long, even French loaf for Bennie and Clovis Martin — the sandwich that fed striking streetcar workers and gave the po-boy its name.

A century later that same family still bakes the original formula: shatter-crisp crust, cloud-soft crumb, strong enough to hold roast beef and gravy without turning into a brick. Those loaves leave Gentilly before breakfast and land on Menge Avenue in time for lunch. Mary Keith has been to the bakery on Mirabeau Avenue — that van is how the original po-boy bread starts its trip to Pass Christian.

That is the difference people taste when they say there is no other authentic New Orleans-style po-boy on the Mississippi Gulf Coast that matches Pirate's Cove.

Mary Keith Rusbridge at John Gendusa Bakery in New Orleans Mary Keith Rusbridge with a bag of John Gendusa po-boy bread
From the water and down the road

Gulf shrimp and oysters. Secret gravy. Barq’s.

Shrimp and oysters come from local seafood purveyors of Pass Christian — Gulf of Mexico product, not a mystery box from somewhere else. Roast beef is cooked here. The gravy is the house secret, and yes, you can get a cup of it for the fries.

We added salads, a deli roast beef for boat days, buffalo chicken and buffalo shrimp bacon ranch, a Cubano, and a crab cake po-boy. We did not mess with the things you already drive here for.

August 17, 1972 Original Pirate’s Cove opens on the 1300 block of East Beach, the former site of Governor White’s House, destroyed in Hurricane Camille. Owned and operated by Jimmy Edwards and Jerald Reed.
May 15, 1975 Mayor Steve Saucier and Maureen Saucier purchase Pirate’s Cove.
1981 Big Mike Lamarca purchases Pirate’s Cove and passes a generation to his son Mike Jr. and wife Dawn, who run it for more than 40 years.
1985 David Necaise joins Pirate’s Cove and learns the po-boy under the Lamarcas. He is still here — now general manager.
2023 Patrick and Mary Keith purchase the restaurant, training under the Lamarcas and General Manager Dave.
Roast beef po-boy with secret gravy and corn nuggets on the deck
Pass Christian Fire Department picking up lunch at Pirate's Cove
This town eats here

Pass Christian Fire Department, grabbing lunch.

Pirate's Cove delivering po-boys to the Pass Christian Police Department

And the Police Department.

Trays of po-boys dropped at the station. Same town. Same lunch.