Sunday, October 25, 2015

First Gumbo

Rainy, rainy this morning, and I decided that it was time for the first gumbo of the season.  Gumbo is a cold-weather food, a Cajun stew, and even if it's not quite cold enough yet, it's time.

When making gumbo, I always start with my grandmother's advice.  I can still hear her saying it, "First, make a roux.".  You can go to the link for the whole story.  Roux-making is a staple of Cajun cooking, and everyone has their own peculiar way of making roux.  I prefer a peanut-butter roux, but some make it almost black.  (I'm referring to the color of the roux.  I don't make it with peanut butter).

The roux is made and mixed with chicken stock.  It's that brown gravy that you can barely see i the large dutch oven.I've already added the deboned chicken.  On the front right burner, I have onions, bell pepper, and celery saute-ing We call that the Trinity of Cajun cooking.  No one cooks anything without onions, bell pepper, and celery.  Some folks just refer to it as "the vegetables".  You've got to have vegetables in your gumbo.   In just a minute, I'll add the vegetables to the dutch oven, and cook some sausage.

Oh, yeah, the link sausage is cooking nicely.  I'll let it cook for a bit more, then add it to the mix.  In that big dutch oven, I've got roux, chicken, chicken stock, vegetable, and the sausage is cooking.  But, as I look at that big pot, I don't believe I have room to add the sausage.  That's often a problem with gumbo.  As you assemble it, you run out of pot space.  So, we do what we're lucky enough to be able to do.


We get out the big crock pot.  If necessary, we'd get out two big crock pots.  Now that the gumbo is assembled, all that's left is the simmering, and a crock pot does that perfectly.  If I had been cooking over a campfire, I'd have made adjustments so as to not run out of pot-space.

I'll let that simmer for a couple of hours, and closer to noon, I'll make a pot of rice.

3 comments:

Old NFO said...

Drooling over here... That looks GOOD! :-)

Ryan said...

Paw Paw, You inspired me to make gumbo today.

Weetabix said...

It's time to make another pot of gumbo. I like my roux about the color of milk chocolate. My wife can tell when I'm making gumbo by the napalm like burns on my forearm - I can never make it without splashing a bit.

When I first started making gumbo, the recipe called for a small can of tomato paste in the roux before adding the stock to help it bind. Have you done it that way? I've never done it without the tomato paste in about 20 years of making gumbo.

Okra in yours? I always add it just because I like it. I've always got chicken in it and sausage, ham, shrimp as I have it on hand or can afford it.

I just finished a great dinner, and commenting about gumbo has my mouth watering.