Gumbo
Ingredients
Roux:
1cup oil (vegetable or lard)
1cup all purpose flour
Meats:
1lb andouille sausage (or smoked sausage if you can't find andouille), sliced and browned
Either:
1lb dark meat chicken, cut into bite sized pieces and sauteed before adding
or
1lb shrimp, oysters, crab
(Traditionally, Gumbo is either chicken OR seafood.)
The Trinity (Base for any Cajun dish):
1 medium sized yellow onion, diced
1 green bell pepper, diced
3-4 stalks celery, diced
Remaining ingredients:
Garlic, several cloves according to taste, diced
Okra, fresh or frozen- if fresh, get 1/2 pound, slice and saute in pan before adding to gumbo (It's not GUMBO without OKRA--- It's what the word means!
)
Cayenne Pepper, to taste
6-8 cups Chicken Broth
Salt, to taste
First, make your roux. I have a trick to save you a lot of sweat and time. Preheat the oven to 350˚. In an oven safe pot, large enough to make the whole Gumbo, slowly mix the flour into the oil on the stove over high heat until smooth. You do not want any lumps in your roux. Instead of stirring this over high heat for an hour, you will put a lid on the pot and transfer to the oven for an hour. The indirect heat will brown the roux perfectly during this hour! It will be dark, almost chocolate brown.
While you are waiting for your roux, get your mis en place ready. When your roux is done, pull it out of the oven and carefully stir in your Trinity and garlic. The roux will be hot enough to saute the vegetables. Turn the heat on medium high. Salt generously at this point.
Whisk in the chicken broth, but make sure to leave the soup fairly thick. Gumbo is a thick soup like a chowder, not chicken noodle soup! You can add more later, if needed. If you don't whisk, your roux will float like balls of fat throughout your soup.
Taste for flavoring now. Add more salt. Add your Cayenne. Remember that it should be spicy but not so hot that you can't taste the other flavors. Add your sausage and chicken (if you're using chicken.) Also add okra. Allow to come to a boil then simmer for about 30 minutes. Don't add seafood until the last 15 minutes so it doesn't overcook.
Seafood: if you use shrimp, I don't leave on the shells. It's too messy. If you're using lump crab meat, go through it a couple times looking for shells. No matter how nice it is, they ALWAYS leave some shells in, which does not make for good eating! Oysters should be strained so you can check for shells, but save the liquor and add to the pot...it really makes the Gumbo special!! If your oysters are huge, just tear them up a little to bite size pieces.
Serve over long grain white rice and enjoy!
Hybrid Mode
