Around the World - Side trip - Mardi Gras!

While Keltin's busy booking our trip to East Africa, I thought we'd have just enough time for a stop home for Mardi Gras. Since that special N'awlins party is less than 3 weeks away, it should give us plenty of time to explore the Cajun & Creole foods of New Orleans. Now I know that NOLA isn't a foreign country, but Mardi Gras is more than just a different country - it's a whole different planet! The party is already revving up in Louisiana, so it's time to get cooking here!

Jambalaya, Muffalettas, Gumbo, Etouffee, Po'Boys, Beignets, Pralines. Maybe someone will even bake a King Cake.

There seems to be a lot of discussion about the difference between Creole & Cajun. I'm not going to start by creating controversy here, BUT, I'll bet some of you have a lot to say on that subject. (Just keep it friendly).

Let's head down to Mardi Gras!

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Yum, yum, yum. The times I've been in New Orleans, I just waited for the next meal to begin - SO much good food. I may have problems with finding ingredients, but this will be fun.

Wonderful idea . I was watching the Food Network (Best Thing I Ever Ate), and they were showing the grilled oysters at Drago's. They were topped with some kind of cheese sauce and looked great.

Crawfish should be available pretty soon.

What a coincidence! I got a new Dutch Oven today and it was just screaming for some Gumbo! I love the red color. Just makes me want to cook and cook and cook! LOL! I don't know if it's "authentic", but it's how I've always made it.

For the Gumbo:

1 lb shrimp, shelled and deveined. (reserve the shells to make broth)
2 lbs smoked sausage (I use Conecah brand)
I T. tomato paste
1 large onion, diced
1 green bell pepper, diced
3 stalks of celery, diced
1/2 C. flour
2 C. of diced okra or file powder to taste
1 tsp. thyme
2 large containers of chicken broth (around 4 cups - 2 for the shrimp broth and 2 for the gumbo)
2 T. unsalted butter
2 C. water
2 C. of shrimp broth
Vegetable Oil

Shell the shrimp and add it to a sauce pan with 2 cups or so of the chicken broth. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and let it simmer for 30 minutes or so then strain the shells from the broth and set the broth aside.

In a 6 quart dutch oven, add 2 T. of veg. oil and heat until it shimmers a bit. Slice the smoked sausage and add to the dutch oven. Cook until it browns a bit and remove, leaving the oil in the DO.

Add the onions, celery and bell pepper to the DO and cook on med. heat until onions become translucent. Remove, again leaving the oil in the DO. Add 2 T. unsalted butter to the oil in the DO.

Turn the heat to low and once the butter is melted, add the flour. Stir constantly to make a golden colored rue. Usually takes about 20 minutes or so. Once the rue reaches the golden color, I stir in the tomato paste and begin adding the remaining chicken broth, stirring constantly. Add the shrimp broth and 2 cups of water.

Add the sausage, vegetables, and thyme to the broth. Once it reaches a boil, this is when you can add okra if you prefer to use that instead of File Powder. ( I prefer the File, but used okra this time). Reduce heat and simmer for an hour. At the end of the cooking time, add the shrimp and cook for 5 more minutes or so. The shrimp will keep cooking in the hot liquid even when it's removed from the heat.

If you choose to use File powder, remove the DO from the heat and let it cool for just a few minutes when it's all done, then add the File powder . If you add it while it's directly on the heat, it will become stringy and not very appetizing.

What a start! Mary, that looks wonderful!

Can you explain the difference in using okra vs file powder? Do they act differently? How does each affect the flavor? Is the okra slimy? Would there ever be a reason to use both?

Anything else you can add would be helpful.

Wow, how beautiful, mhend!

Love the look of the sausage! Was it very spicy-hot?

Lee

Ooooh, Mary! Your dutch oven is beautiful, and so is your gumbo!

SilverSage said:

What a start! Mary, that looks wonderful!

Can you explain the difference in using okra vs file powder? Do they act differently? How does each affect the flavor? Is the okra slimy? Would there ever be a reason to use both?

Anything else you can add would be helpful.

Click to expand...

Thanks, SS.

The main difference to me between okra and file powder is taste. I can't tell a difference in the thickening properties that each offer. I love the taste of file powder, but the okra is nice too. The okra pretty much disappears during the cooking process, which is good because I cannot eat boiled okra. Period. The slimyness is more than I can handle. LOL.

Like I said in the recipe though, the file powder should be added after removing it from the heat and giving it a few minutes to cool. Otherwise, it will become stringy. I learned that from experience. LOL.

I've always heard that for authentic gumbo you should never use both. I don't know why that is, but there is definately two distinct schools of thought on this.

QSis said:

Wow, how beautiful, mhend!

Love the look of the sausage! Was it very spicy-hot?

Lee

Click to expand...

Thanks Lee and Karen! The sausage was just a hickory smoked sausage. It has a little kick, but it's nothing severe. It just tickles the back of your throat, letting you know the spice is there.

mhend said:

What a coincidence! I got a new Dutch Oven today and it was just screaming for some Gumbo! I love the red color. Just makes me want to cook and cook and cook! LOL! I don't know if it's "authentic", but it's how I've always made it.

Click to expand...

That gumbo looks fantastic

If anyone wants to come work....just let me know

Creole cuisine is a result of french, african, and spanish culinary influences. It's also of a higher society, if that makes any sense. Cajun cuisine is more of a low country type of dining, a result of the acadians influence.

There are traditional king cake bakers here like I've never seen. Most consider it a mortal sin to put anything (think filling, nuts, cheese, etc) into a king cake. The purists believe it should only be a brioche, glazed and sugared. Many love it stuffed, with cheese, nuts, fruit preserves, etc.

At this point, I'm looking at being open daily from the 21st through March 8th. The first week will only be slightly longer hours. From the 25th, however, I'll most likely be open from 6am till midnight.

People down here are very traditional when it comes to Mardi Gras...some eat at the same establishement each Mardi Gras for the past 20 years.

VeraBlue said:

If anyone wants to come work....just let me know

From the 25th, however, I'll most likely be open from 6am till midnight.

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Wow. No wonder you'd like some help, Vera.

Tonight, I made gumbo! I've never done that dark roux before, so it was quite a learning experience.

I read lots of recipes, and they all had different little twists. I decided to make mine with shrimp, crab, and andouille sausage. I used okra, which was fried up a little before tossing it in the pot.

I let the roux get good and dark - like dark chocolate. Then stirred in the onions, peppers & celery. When it was all tender, I added a half cup of white wine before putting in the shrimp stock. I was surprised at how much flavor was extracted from those shrimp shells!

Okra, garlic, bay leaf, thyme, and some tomato paste. After it simmered for a good 45 minutes, I added a pound each of shrimp and lump crab, along with some chopped scallions.

Served it over rice.

I have enough left over for 2 or 3 meals. Does anyone know how it freezes?

I would go for a bowl that looks good SS andouille sausages hard to find around these parts, at least, the authentic kind. Great pictures too.

Wow Cajun / Creole cuisine (I did read above that they are different but don't know the difference between each dish) sounds amazing the mix of seafood and spices makes my mouth water, being from the UK there are not that many Creole restaurants (I wish there were) but the stuff I have tasted is soooo tasty, and I will be trying out some of these recipe's.

SilverSage said:

Tonight, I made gumbo! I've never done that dark roux before, so it was quite a learning experience.

I read lots of recipes, and they all had different little twists. I decided to make mine with shrimp, crab, and andouille sausage. I used okra, which was fried up a little before tossing it in the pot.

I let the roux get good and dark - like dark chocolate. Then stirred in the onions, peppers & celery. When it was all tender, I added a half cup of white wine before putting in the shrimp stock. I was surprised at how much flavor was extracted from those shrimp shells!

Okra, garlic, bay leaf, thyme, and some tomato paste. After it simmered for a good 45 minutes, I added a pound each of shrimp and lump crab, along with some chopped scallions.

Served it over rice.

I have enough left over for 2 or 3 meals. Does anyone know how it freezes?

Click to expand...

Your gumbo looks delicious! I think you are going to find that when you re-heat the gumbo, your shrimp will get overcooked. So, you can take out the shrimp and the large pieces of crab, re-heat, and then add the seafood back into the hot liquid for just a minute or two.

A little something I learned from reading Emeril Lagasse/Marcelle Bienvenu's Louisiana Real and Rustic: The word "etouffee" (ay-too-fay) means smothered. They also point out the many different opinions on how to make a "true" etouffee. Some say that you don't start with a roux because if you do, you're making a stew or fricassee. Some say you must add tomatoes, some say don't. And on and on, reminds me of the fuss over how to make a true gumbo .

I used his recipe as a base, but made a few changes.

Shrimp Etouffee:

Cooksie, that looks great. But please tell how you made it.

What makes an etouffee differ from a gumbo? Is it just the roux? Or is it mre than that?

I think etouffee differs from gumbo in that etouffee is more of a sauce or gravy served over rice. It's thicker than gumbo, which is more of a soup/stew. Gumbo usually starts with a dark roux. A blonde roux is usually the basis for etouffee, but lots of people make etouffee with a dark roux. Some people will even tell you that it's not etouffee if you don't use crawfish. I think it's whatever floats your particular boat.


I used:
Butter
Chopped white onions
Chopped green onions
Chopped celery
Minced garlic
Tony Chachere’s Original Seasoning
Flour
Shrimp stock (shells boiled down with some Tony’s)
Chopped fresh parsley

Method:
Sauce onions and celery in butter. Add garlic. Add flour and shrimp stock. Season to taste with Tony’s. Simmer. Add shrimp. Continue to simmer until shrimp turn pink. Add parsley. Serve over rice. Sprinkle on some Frank’s or Texas Pete’s if you want some more heat.


The recipe is on page 89 of Louisiana Real and Rustic, but you can google because someone put the recipe word-for-word out there in google-land.


Here's some Crawfish Etouffee that I made a while back:

etouffe means 'smothered'....where a gumbo is more of a stew/soup.

Looks great Cooksie and SS. I'm going to have to make that crawfish etoufee soon. That looks really delicious! I've never tried them. I think I would enjoy them prepared this way.

Each year DH and I go to a crawfish boil and music festival in Birmingham, and they serve up crawfish in mounds! They look pretty, but I've never been able to make myself eat them that way. LOL.