Gumbo

[col klink]

I finally got my smoker back from my buddy last weekend and smoked up a couple of chickens. I have almost a whole chicken left over so I'm making gumbo out of it. First I made stock out of the left over chicken carcasses, about two quarts (I really wish the plural was carci, two hard c's, but it's not 'cause, as I'm imformed by a retired English professor, it doesn't have a latin base, but carci would be cool). Then I followed one of the recipes from the Food Network website (sans andouille, click for recipe) which didn't require making a roux. How important is making a roux for gumbo? I've also made gumbos with smoked duck (and smoked duck stock), andouille and shrimp or whatever looks the fresh.

So how do you make gumbo?

As an aside, these chickens were the first that I didn't finish in the smoker but pulled them out at around 150F, lest them rest, carved them and threw them under the broiler to finish. They had a very crispy skin, but all the fat was rendered out and thus no taste. Next time I'll pull 'em out at 160F and give them less time under the broiler.

[carla]

All I can say, Colonel, is that I wish I could eat the food you cook.

[col klink]

All I can say, Colonel, is that I wish I could eat the food you cook.

Thanks, but tonight's gumbo I wouldn't feel comfortable dishing out and calling it "gumbo." It was tasty enough, but it tasted more like a spicey minestrone than a gumbo and surprisingly enough, not very smokey.

Anywho, I posted the thread before I finished/started cooking and of course not tasting the finished product. First of all, no tomatos, they have no place in gumbo. Second, I believe they're should be roux. My roomate basically said gumbo is basically roux and stock and everything I've tasted in the past supports this. Can others support this theory?

[Jinmyo]

I'm certainly no expert in regards to gumbo but my understanding is that there are basically two kinds of gumbo: those with a dark and those with a light roux. Sans roux, not gumbo.

[Suzanne F]

"Gumbo" literally means okra -- African origin. (Should multiple pods of okra be called okrae? But I digress.) Gumbo, the dish, can be thickened with roux, okra, or filé, which is powdered sassafras. It's a pretty flexible dish in terms of what can go into it. I've even seen versions that do not include the Holy Trinity (celery, green bell pepper, onion)! Otherwise: chicken and sausage; shrimp and okra; shrimp and oyster; wild duck and oyster; duck; seafood; chicken; gumbo z'herbes (with lots of greens as well as ham and andouille, or vegetarian).

Kind of like cassoulet: it's a good excuse to cook up a big pot of something and then argue about it. 'Cause everybody's is different.

[Toby]

The best thing about gumbos is that their are almost no rules, except for "first you make your roux." Howard Mitcham in Creole Gumbo and All That Jazz calls the roux the "soul essence of most Creole-Cajun cooking." He says that "some of the things it does are almost metaphysical." Without a roux, it's not gumbo.

When I first started making gumbo, I did a slow-cooked roux that took forever and never got dark enough. Then I read Prudhomme's recipe in his Louisiana Kitchen cookbook -- he does a high heat method that takes him about 5 minutes; I cook it a little slower, about 8 minutes. (His book has very detailed directions.)

Prudhomme says that "light and medium-brown roux are used in sauces or gravies for dark, heavy meats such as beef, with game such as elk and venison, and with dark-meat fowl such as duck, geese.... Dark red-brown and black roux are used in sauces and gravies for sweet, light, white meats such as pork, rabbit, veal and all kinds of freshwater and saltwater fish and shellfish ... black roux are best to use in gumbos because the darkest roux results in the thinnest, best-tasting gumbos." Black rouxs are scary to make, and I cheat a little by cooking the roux until it's very dark brown and then adding the onions and spices and stirring for a minute or two more; by then it's pretty dark. I then turn off the heat and cover the pan for 10 minutes or so before adding the roux to simmering stock. I use a lot of very hot African bird cayenne powder and white pepper, but no black pepper and no green bell pepper.

I used to make gumbo using file powder (once I used okra), but now I just use the roux for thickening. You also need a good, flavorful stock.

I've made seafood (shrimp and crab) gumbo, chicken and andouille gumbo, dried and fresh shrimp gumbo with hard boiled eggs, duck and hot smoked pheasant sausage gumbo, turkey neck gumbo, and rooster gumbo with andouille. For the last few years, the gumbo I make most often is chicken feet and hot smoked sausage (andouille, smoked pheasant or venison) with hard boiled eggs. The egg yolks mushed into the dark, flavorful gravy are luscious. I once made crawfish bisque (which is pretty close to gumbo), but that was a long, drawn out process.

Roux is also the base of dirty rice, but you can also just use leftover gumbo as the base.

[Jinmyo]

Oh, okay, Suzanne. I thought it had to have a roux to be called gumbo. I believe I heard Proudhomme say that.

I'm not sure though why someone would want to call a nice thickened soup "gumbo" anyway.

edit:

And there's Toby's post now.

[John Whiting]

Here's my own adapted gumbo recipe. Half the fun is in the detail.

################################

While I was trying to decide what to do with the chouriço sausage I bought at the BBC Good Food Show, a spam message (appropriate neologism!) arrived from a cookbook hustler, offering me a collection of authentic Cajun recipes he’d learned at his mother’s elbow. As an inducement, he included, ABSOLUTELY FREE, his recipe for Cajun Chicken and Sausage Gumbo. Although emasculated for effeminate sissy Caucasian palates, it included authentic touches such as a warning that YOU MUST KEEP STIRRING OR THE FLOUR WILL BURN. And so I consulted other authorities, went shopping, and installed myself in the kitchen for the rest of the morning. The amended result was as good a basic gumbo as I’ve eaten. It’s even better the next day, cold, which is my ultimate criterion for everything, including marriage.

CAJUN CHICKEN AND SAUSAGE GUMBO

Start with a FREE RANGE CHICKEN

FOR THE STOCK:

Skin and bone the chicken. Set the meat aside. In a thick-bottomed kettle or pressure cooker, brown the skin and bones in a little OLIVE OIL. Add sliced ONION, CARROT, and a couple of sliced ribs of CELERY. Fry until limp. Add SALT to help extract the juices from the meat, HERBS to taste, and about a quart and a half of WATER. Simmer covered for an hour, or pressure-cook for twenty minutes. Strain; skim off the fat or pour off through a separator.

FOR THE GUMBO:

While the stock is simmering, chop an ONION, a GREEN SWEET (BELL) PEPPER, and 3 ribs of CELERY. Cut up the CHICKEN MEAT into large bite-sized pieces. In a Dutch oven or similar heavy casserole, fry them lightly in 1/2 CUP OLIVE OIL, together with 1 LB SLICED STRONG SAUSAGE, SMOKY OR GARLIC. (Minus its skin, the chicken won’t brown without overcooking.) Remove from the oil; get it all out and be certain none is stuck to the bottom--it will give you trouble at the next stage. Add 3/4 CUP FLOUR little by little, stirring constantly. You should have a paste the consistency of heavy cream; if it starts to solidify into lumps, add a little more oil. You should be able to mix any uncooked flour continually to the bottom. Continue cooking and stirring until the mixture turns golden brown (not black!). This should be a long slow process--some cooks deliberately take as long as half an hour. Add the chopped vegetables and stir them well into the roux until they start to go limp. Add as much CHOPPED GARLIC as you think you want; it will become much milder in the cooking.

Now add the liquid, which should be incorporated slowly at the beginning, constantly stirring. (The water in the vegetables will have helped to begin the process.) If the flour and oil are properly cooked and you’re not in a hurry with the liquid, you won’t have trouble with lumps. To my taste, this recipe needs the acidity of tomato, and so at this stage I would stir in 1 CAN OR TUBE OF TOMATO PASTE. This in turn invites a bottle of ROBUST RED WINE, together with the CHICKEN STOCK, making about two quarts of liquid in all. Add the CHICKEN and SAUSAGE. Stir in CHOPPED CHILI PEPPERS/CAYENNE/TOBASCO SAUCE in any combination, as much as you like. (If you don’t like it hot, this recipe has plenty of flavor without being mouth-searing.) Add 2 CUPS BROWN RICE, previously rinsed. Add HERBS to taste; some like to add them late in the cooking so that their flavor remains more distinct. Season discreetly with SALT AND PEPPER and check for seasoning near the end of the cooking time. Better to err on the side of caution; strong hot chili can affect your sensitivity to salt.

Now comes a long slow simmer, about an hour, or even slower and longer. (This is a wonderful one-pot dish; you can add more vegetables at any time during the simmer. Or prawns. Or practically anything you like.) Keep it covered; stir it often and add more water if necessary as the rice absorbs it. (The thicker the sauce, the more likely that it may stick and burn.) By the end the sauce should be thick, dark and rich. At a slow simmer, the chicken won’t overcook and the brown rice, though soft, will still keep its shape and not disintegrate.

If there’s any left after the second day, you should either stick with Heinz baked beans or join a monastic order of self-denial.

©1998 John Whiting, Diatribal Press, London

[Wilfrid]

My understanding is that a dark roux is required for gumbo, and certainly every gumbo I've had in Louisiana has been pretty dark. This is where I've had difficulty -and thanks, Toby, for the Prudhomme tip. I stir and stir and stir and never getting anything which loks much darker than a digestive biscuit. Even John's "golden brown" sounds a little light - will you get a really dark gumbo from that? So eahc of my attempts at gumbo has ended up as a pale - minstrone, indeed - colored soup which I've had to call something else.

Toby: how dark does the Prudhomme roux get?

[APPS411]

Col,

Gumbo is a fabulous dish when made right. I have seen it come out wrong many times and all of them was due to the improper cooking of the roux.

Originally from NY, I have been living and working down in Baton Rouge, LA for the past year and a half. I can easily say that this city is the home of the best gumbo's, jambalayas, dirty rice, creoles etc. New Orleans is good but not anywhere near as good as over here in Baton Rouge. New Orleans seems to always try to put a spin on traditional favorites that shouldn't be messed with.

Well anyway, since I've been down here I've been learning to cook all of these goodies from some of the locals that have been doing it for generations. Here's how I was taught to make a gumbo. Warning, it does take some practice and is best learned by watching someone do it.

First in a cast Iron pan, begin cooking equal amounts of flour (plain white) and oil (peanut or vegetable). Over med-high heat cook and stir for a few minutes to combine. I like to add a bit more flour to the mixture so my proportion is roughly 1 and 1/4 cup of flour to 1 cup of oil. It just makes for a consistency that browns easier. Also, it's harder to make a roux w/ a very small quantity of ingredients so try not to scale it down too much. I use a 10" cast iron pan which equates to about a 1/4" layer of roux in the pan. That works the best. Cast Iron is good to control the low temperature cooking that will be required. Plus it works best to season the pan.

Ok, so once it is all combined you want to turn down the heat very low until it bubbles VERY slowly. It will sort of look like the bubbles rising from pancakes before you flip them. Cooking this roux takes about an hour and a half, this will vary on the temperature, pan material and thickness, size so don't hold me to it. The fast method works but your window of time when the roux must stop cooking is shortened drastically and I notice that the flavor never develops as good as the slow method.

Continue cooking at this temperature, adjusting if needed. You will need to check give the roux a stir ever 5 to 10 minutes. As it cooks the oil will rise and the flour will fall to the pan, stiring is needed to prevent burning. I like to cook my roux to the color of Dark chocolate, almost black , but not w/ a very slight shade of brown.

The classic mistake is to not cook the roux enough. This causes a lack of developed flavor and a very thick gravy like gumbo. Yuck! As the flour particles cook, they loose there thickening ability, and add more in the category of flavor than texture.

Alright so when you think your roux is done, the best way to find out if you cooked in enough is to test out it's thickening ability. To do this add a tablespoon of the roux to a small sauce pan. Bring it up to heat and then add about a cup of water and boil to combine. If the roux is not cooked enough you will see a gravy type consistency that will heavily coat the back of a spoon. If this is so, then continue cooking your roux for another 15 to 30 minutes.

So finally your roux is done, take about a 1/2 to 3/4 of a cup of it and begin heating to med to med high heat in a small stock pot. I like to make smaller batches so I use a 6 quart. Add 1 large diced onion, a few stalks of celery diced and a green pepper diced. (I like a 2, 1, 1, Onion, celery, pepper ratio). Cook in the roux for 10 or 15 minutes, stiring to coat. Then add a few chopped garlic cloves and begin to season the mixture w/ whatever. Salt, pepper, cheyenne, thyme, white pepper (my favorite), etc. Now is a good time to throw in some choped okra also, which release enzymes to add the the body of the gumbo. Once all of the vegetables are slightly cooked and coated, add your stock. Play this by ear and add until the right flavor and consistency is reached. Then add your meat and cook slowly to mend flavor for an hour or so. I add whatever I have, combining meats and fish is not a problem. I like sausage, shrimp, crawfish and chicken mixture.

Remember this is not a fast process but the finished product is great.

Serve by ladeling over a some rice in a bowl, top w/ gumbo file.

Nextime I make one I'll post some pictures of the roux so you can get an idea of the desired color.

Also, you can save the leftover roux in a container at room temp.

Enjoy

[Fat Guy]

At the end of this installment of my cross-country journal, you'll find a good gumbo recipe from King Neptune's restaurant in Gulf Shores, Alabama.

[SobaAddict70]

I thought that roux was made with flour and BUTTER. Shows you what I know.

Also, I thought that a commandment of gumbo was to thicken it using either file or okra. Ditto re above.

Finally, while seafood and meat (mixed) gumbos exist, you won't find any mixed types in a gumbo purist's kitchen. The prohibition against mixing meat and seafood in a gumbo dates from the tradition of strict observance of Lent, in Louisiana. You had your meat gumbos and your fish/seafood gumbos (usually served during Lent, or on Fridays), never a hybrid version.

SA

[Toby]

My understanding is that a dark roux is required for gumbo, and certainly every gumbo I've had in Louisiana has been pretty dark.  This is where I've had difficulty -and thanks, Toby, for the Prudhomme tip.  I stir and stir and stir and never getting anything which loks much darker than a digestive biscuit.  Even John's "golden brown" sounds a little light  - will you get a really dark gumbo from that?  So eahc of my attempts at gumbo has ended up as a pale - minstrone, indeed - colored soup which I've had to call something else.

Toby:  how dark does the Prudhomme roux get?

Prudhomme's Louisiana Kitchen cookbook has color photos of light-brown roux (the only one not made over high heat -- kind of blonde), medium-brown roux (caramel colored), dark red-brown roux (bitter chocolate), and the black roux (black).

I've only once been brave enough to get it black, usually I'm between dark brown and black. In a sense the high-heat method is like stir-frying -- you have to have everything right there, all ready, don't answer phone, door. I modify his recipe somewhat, I turn the heat down incrementally as the roux darkens; I've never burned it that way, although it takes a few minutes more, but it's all over in 10 minutes.

Prudhomme's first two books -- Louisiana Kitchen and the Prudhomme Family Cookbook -- are extraordinary. Beyond the step-by-step roux instructions, there are recipes for Roasted Duck with Duck Rice and Sweet Potato Eggplant Gravy, Sweet Potato-Pecan Pie, great Banana Bread, coush-coush, Louisiana doughnuts, corn and chicken maque choux, great potato salad, variety of roasted pork.... The only thing I really disagree with him about is his use of converted rice, but the recipes work fine with real rice.

[Suzanne F]

Finally, while seafood and meat (mixed) gumbos exist, you won't find any mixed types in a gumbo purist's kitchen.  The prohibition against mixing meat and seafood in a gumbo dates from the tradition of strict observance of Lent, in Louisiana.  You had your meat gumbos and your fish/seafood gumbos (usually served during Lent, or on Fridays), never a hybrid version.

Soba, you tell that to the editors of Acadiana Profile -- The Magazine of the Cajun Country.

As for the components of the roux: you're probably thinking of roux for classic French sauces, when, yes, it's clarified butter all the way. But maybe butter doesn't keep all that well in the bayou, so they use oil. I've seen recipes with whole wheat flour and oil, and even one with a dry roux -- just oven-browned ww flour. Of course, that was in a book of Cajun Vegetarian Cooking, so how much credence do we give it?

[SobaAddict70]

Finally, while seafood and meat (mixed) gumbos exist, you won't find any mixed types in a gumbo purist's kitchen.  The prohibition against mixing meat and seafood in a gumbo dates from the tradition of strict observance of Lent, in Louisiana.  You had your meat gumbos and your fish/seafood gumbos (usually served during Lent, or on Fridays), never a hybrid version.

Soba, you tell that to the editors of Acadiana Profile -- The Magazine of the Cajun Country.

Ah, but they're Cajuns. Not Creoles.

hehe

SA

[KyleW]

I thought that roux was made with flour and BUTTER.  Shows you what I know.

Also, I thought that a commandment of gumbo was to thicken it using either file or okra.  Ditto re above.

SA

Rouxs for sauces are made with butter and flour. But every roux I've seen for gumbo uses vegetable oil. I think it probably has to do with the heat you need to generate to get a nice dark roux. I think butter would burn.

I'm not sure it's a commandment, but gumbos are thickened with either file or okra. By the time you cook out the roux to its nice dark color it has lost most if not all of its thickening power. As Prudhomme says, the darkest rouxs make the thinnest gumbos. I've tried his high heat roux. It works. It's a little like what I imagine dirving a race car would be like; exciting and terrifying!

[Suzanne F]

Finally, while seafood and meat (mixed) gumbos exist, you won't find any mixed types in a gumbo purist's kitchen.  The prohibition against mixing meat and seafood in a gumbo dates from the tradition of strict observance of Lent, in Louisiana.  You had your meat gumbos and your fish/seafood gumbos (usually served during Lent, or on Fridays), never a hybrid version.

Soba, you tell that to the editors of Acadiana Profile -- The Magazine of the Cajun Country.

Ah, but they're Cajuns. Not Creoles.

hehe

SA

Gumbo is a Cajun dish, not Créole.

Cajuns are the descendents of the French-speaking folks who were forced out of Acadia (Canada) -- go back and re-read "Evangeline." They became farmers and hunters -- relatively low-class. Créoles were sometimes described as persons of European descent (French, Spanish, Portuguese) born in the New World; but that group also included those in the upper class of mixed African/European heritage (think Jelly Roll Morton).

Hehe yourself.

[Suzanne F]

Hi, Kyle!

As Prudhomme says, the darkest rouxs make the thinnest gumbos.

Of course, because the flour has lots its ability to gelatinize. But the flavor ... aaah.

[SobaAddict70]

Finally, while seafood and meat (mixed) gumbos exist, you won't find any mixed types in a gumbo purist's kitchen.  The prohibition against mixing meat and seafood in a gumbo dates from the tradition of strict observance of Lent, in Louisiana.  You had your meat gumbos and your fish/seafood gumbos (usually served during Lent, or on Fridays), never a hybrid version.

Soba, you tell that to the editors of Acadiana Profile -- The Magazine of the Cajun Country.

Ah, but they're Cajuns. Not Creoles.

hehe

SA

Gumbo is a Cajun dish, not Créole.

Cajuns are the descendents of the French-speaking folks who were forced out of Acadia (Canada) -- go back and re-read "Evangeline." They became farmers and hunters -- relatively low-class. Créoles were sometimes described as persons of European descent (French, Spanish, Portuguese) born in the New World; but that group also included those in the upper class of mixed African/European heritage (think Jelly Roll Morton).

Hehe yourself.

I know that gumbo is a Cajun dish and not a Creole dish. Ditto for jambalaya and boudan. However, pain perdu is not Cajun.

Thank you for the lecture on cultural origins. (Not to mention that I know where Cajuns/Acadians came from, and also Creoles. I suppose that's irrelevant, as far as you're concerned. Couldn't you try to be a little bit more condescending or just a wee bit more patronizing? I wasn't sure I managed to get a sufficient dose.)

My point is that Creoles have a certain sensibility about things Cajun, or perhaps a more accurate statement would be to say that Creoles sometimes ignore Cajun traditions and make things their own way.

*shrug*

But what the hell do I know? Clearly, I'm shouldn't post on this board cuz I'm not worthy.

SA

[Toby]

There's a wonderful story in the old Time-Life book American Cooking: Creole and Acadian (text by Peter S. Fiebleman) about two cooks (also sisters-in-law) fighting over the correct way to cook gumbo (file or okra, meat and seafood, or seafood "maigre"), and having a cook-off, cooking side-by-side and shouting insults at each other all the while.

Fiebleman wrote: "It was a battle that grew out of an important, though often forgotten rule of New Orleans cooking. ... There is no one way to do anything -- or, to put it differently, there are at least 200 ways to do everything. A gumbo is a gumbo in much the way that a snowflake is a snowflake or a fingerprint is a fingerprint. ... South Louisiana cooking is inventive -- it had to be, or it wouldn't have invented itself."

[Wilfrid]

So, a quick way and a slow way. I'll have to try one or the other. And thanks APPS for the explanation of why the roux doesn't thicken the gumbo - that was something which had puzzled me.

[Priscilla]

I have to second Toby's commendation of Paul Prudhomme's books. There is so much good information and technique packed into them, and everything he makes just tastes so good (to me; I realize not everyone would agree). I think he is one of the most underrated important influences on good American cookery, underrated or just plain uncredited.

Also, Craig Claiborne, RIP, himself a Southerner, had a Southern cookery book that I have found very useful. And the Time-Life that Toby also cites, the Creole/Acadian volume and the Southern.

There is a gumbo I sometimes make the recipe for which I got from a Cajun piano tuner and musician whom I closely questioned whilst he worked, and he specifies (for the particular recipe) that the roux be cooked to chocolate brown, Hershey-bar brown, a reference point I appreciated the specificity of.

[Toby]

I have to second Toby's commendation of Paul Prudhomme's books.  There is so much good information and technique packed into them, and everything he makes just tastes so good (to me; I realize not everyone would agree).  I think he is one of the most underrated important influences on good American cookery, underrated or just plain uncredited.

Yes, it's as if no one could get past the blackened redfish (which takes up one page and some pictures in the Louisiana Kitchen cookbook).

Priscilla, what did you put in the gumbo? I'm always looking for new gumbos.

[Priscilla]

Yes, one imagines Chef Prudhomme might rue the day he went nationwide with Blackened Redfish. He did speak up for its scarcity, and switched to recommending thick tuna steaks for blackening, as I recall.

Toby, into the Cajun piano tuner's gumbo goes the typical load of chopped onion, and sliced okra (no celery!), a whole dismantled chicken or equivalent, andouille, cut up, and (what I think is key to the mysteriously delicious flavor) a little crabmeat, some crawfish tails--I have used shrimp, sometimes--and a pint of oysters. The seafood of course cooks visibly away over hours and hours of simmering, becoming just a seasoning. T. salt, 2 T. cayenne, couple t. black pepper, I believe are the spices, subject to personal adjustment.

One time a strict vegetarian took thirds.

Do you like a little turned-out-timbale of rice in the middle of the bowl, with a moat of gumbo around? I do.

[Toby]

... into the Cajun piano tuner's gumbo goes the typical load of chopped onion, and sliced okra (no celery!), a whole dismantled chicken or equivalent, andouille, cut up, and (what I think is key to the mysteriously delicious flavor) a little crabmeat, some crawfish tails--I have used shrimp, sometimes--and a pint of oysters.  The seafood of course cooks visibly away over hours and hours of simmering, becoming just a seasoning.  T. salt, 2 T. cayenne, couple t. black pepper, I believe are the spices, subject to personal adjustment.

The cooked down seafood is brilliant. I can't wait to make this. You don't even really need to start with stock, although that would give it even more depth.

Do you brown the chicken pieces and andouille first, or just throw them in?

Yes, I sometimes do the rice in timbale shape in center with gumbo moat. I almost always use hard-boiled egg, chopped up nicely for other people and sprinkled on with minced parsley and green onion, just mashed into the gumbo for myself. I never use file powder or okra anymore, but find that between the stock (I usually use chicken feet) and the mashed hard-boiled egg, the gumbo is thick enough for me (just coats a spoon).