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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   2549 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for August 2, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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It is now Saturday morning here, but inspired by @clo , @AsTheDominoesFall , and @hydroacetylene I decided to go for it and try making gumbo again last night, Friday evening.

Usually I am what is in Japan called a "kitchen drinker" and imbibe a nice glass of red or a beer or whatever I can get my grubby hands on while chopping my celery, but this time I settled for this. I only recommend it for the hard-core who do not care what they are pouring down their gullet as long as it seems remotely related to beer (I was in that category as I made the gumbo).

I started, as one does, with a roux of flour and oil. It started like this.. I may have had the heat up too high (it was on the small burner as low as it would go) but I got distracted and the roux burned and I had to scrap it. Undaunted I began again. The new roux looked like this when I considered putting in the trinity which in my case also contained garlic, but I avoided the temptation, mainly because my gumbo is never dark enough. I kept stirring. It eventually looked like this..

You may notice the portion is small. That is for two reasons. 1) I was not sure of success. 2) I am enculturated thoroughly to Japan and thus I think small when it comes to portion sizes. I held off until the roux was darker, ultimately like this though it was darker in reality than this photo shows.

Too much going on for me to take photos of other phases, but I added sausage (unfortunately this means the small, ubiquitous and not that tasty Japanese ソーセージ, shrimp, laurel leaf, and all this..

What I did not add is Tabasco, as although I like Tabasco it makes everything taste like itself. I ate a smallish portion over rice with the actual dinner. It wasn't bad though I expect both the users mentioned above and probably I can do better in the future.

Advice welcome.

You can go a bit darker if you're gutsy - I now use the heat-your-oil-until-spitting-hot and then dump in flour speed method instead of the slow one, although there's no difference except a saving of time. Add trinity to roux when the roux is dark enough, it'll hiss and sizzle and bring down the temp so let that go for a bit BEFORE adding garlic (garlic can burn quite easily).

Spring for the good stock, you can get some good chicken stock that isn't garbage at reasonable prices these days. Tabasco is slightly worthwhile as a finishing agent for the slight acid kick that really livens up the dish, you can use any other hot sauce with a vinegary component. Spices, you can use some prepackaged cajun stuff if you're cheap but it's just garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cayenne, thyme and oregano in various ratios. Salt and pepper are musts.

I tend to keep my land and my sea a bit separate, for seafood based gumbo I add a can of crushed tomatoes. For chicken and sausage I dump in some amber ale before adding the rest of my stock. If you're lazy look out for the cooked food aisle at supermarkets, premade discount rotisserie chicken or turkey wings work a treat. I've occasionally used even the packaged smoked duck breasts you can get at Japanese or Asian supermarkets after trimming the skin a bit.

You will get a grease slick after long cooking, skim it if you want but don't skim all of it. If you're truly frugal you can save what you skim off for some other cooking, it's delicious and will work in other savory dishes fine. One thing I used to do is use some of it to stir-fry my okra a bit before adding.

Pour a dark beer into the roux when it's done and before you add the trinity. Stir it all together and add stock(I'm sure Japan has at least good fish stock) into a gravy before adding water. That's the stage where I would drop in bay leaves, dried cayenne peppers, salt and pepper, chicken and sausage(shrimp goes later), etc.

Just looking at the gumbo I'd guess it didn't simmer quite long enough, but it certainly looks like you got something reasonably authentic.

Wouldn't doing it in this order get in the way of getting any caramelization/Maillard reaction in the vegetables, which you'd generally want to offset the bitter flavours?

I have made gumbo fairly successfully several times by following this guy's recipe. Getting the right kind of coarse and dense sausage is probably difficult in Japan, but there should be good chicken stock?

My grandparents never caramelized the vegetables in their gumbo, the long cooking times broke them down. And usually they used roux from a can and mixed it with some stock/water/beer before adding the veggies anyways, although I make my own roux and do roux-beer-enough stock to keep from burning-vegetables-rest of the stock-protein and seasonings.

Thank you! Yes I was expecting a comment on simmer time. I was on the clock and served it far too early. Still there is still a cup or two left for today so maybe I'll cook it down a bit more.

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