Aaaahhhh, gumbo!No, that’s not right. You have to tip your head all the way back, percolate a warm column of air up the back of your throat. Aaaaaahhhhhh, gumbo! The reason I was born!
No day is all bad if it includes a bowl of gumbo. Hot, spicy, sweet, thick, meaty, smoky, salty, garlicky – always toes and toes of precious garlic! And history. Every Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Fourth of July, or any holiday my family went to my Cajun grandmother’s house it was there on the kitchen table just waiting for the assault. And the way she made it, it assaulted back. (I mean that in a good way. As far as I am concerned, food has to have flavor, real flavor, or I do not want it.)
Cooking gumbo is a rare pleasure for me. Since I am not the chief cook in my household and my work keeps my tied up, I only make gumbo when I have a day off. It takes a whole day. The work only fills an hour or so, but gumbo has to simmer for hours on the stove, attended to, loved, to reach its optimum flavor.
It is not complicated to make. This would be expected, since it was invented by Cajuns, a people who abhor complications. Cajuns fish, they hunt, they tell stories, they cook, and they eat. That’s about it.
Gumbo is made year round, but because of its long cooking time it is traditionally a staple of the winter months. When the temperature on the bayou is 98°F and the humidity is 85%, no one wants to heat his house up with a huge boiling pot of gumbo.
And huge is the key. Gumbo is made grand, and something is lost if this kickshaw is not shared with the many. A pot of gumbo is for the block, or the extended family. There is an old Creole patois phrase, gumbo-ya-ya, which means, “Everybody’s talking at once.” Gumbo is a community creation, and friends and family are the last ingredient.
In my mind, I once gave myself the title of the best gumbo cooker I know. My gumbo is very spicy, but is extremely rich and has a very complex flavor. Unfortunately, I think I have recently been dethroned by my wife, despite the fact that I am a Cajun and she is Indian (as in Asian-Indian, not Native American). What she gradually learned is how to make roux over low heat so it becomes very dark and intense. Get that right and your gumbo is going to be remarkable. Also, Indian cuisine is no stranger to the hot peppers and spices that make gumbo special. Since my wife was already skilled with the cayenne, it was only a matter of time before her gumbo entered the ethereal.
How To Make It
There are many varieties of gumbo, but the main two are chicken and seafood. I will describe chicken gumbo, since the ingredients can be found almost anywhere in the world. Good, fresh seafood can be hard to come by and there is no sense in spoiling a great dish with inferior ingredients.
The first step is to get a whole chicken or its equivalent in chicken parts and brown it in a skillet. There is no need to cook it all the way through; the stewing process will take care of that. Lightly coat the chicken with salt, pepper, cayenne pepper, and garlic powder and then fry it for a minute or two until brown.
In the same skillet, without cleaning it, repeat this step with a about 2 pounds of hot sausage. The traditional gumbo sausage is andouille, a Cajun pork sausage spiced with cayenne, garlic, and thyme. If this andouille is not available in your area any kind of spiced, smoked sausage will do fine. Again, just a little browning, and then set the andouille aside. Leave the drippings in the skillet – you will use the grease for flavoring in the next step.
Next, make a roux. The roux is the base for many Louisiana dishes, and if you can make a good one you will go far in this world. A roux is little more than a gravy, half flour and half oil. Originally Cajuns used lard, but as a doctor I can’t recommend that (although just between you and me if you do use lard let me know how it turned out). I use vegetable oil.
The amount of roux you make depends on the amount of gumbo you want. I have learned the hard way that if you make too much roux the gumbo comes out oily. So, to make about 1-1/2 to 2 gallons of gumbo, I use 2/3 cup of flour and 2/3 cup of oil. Combine the two in the skillet under low heat, stirring constantly to get the lumps out and keep the flour from burning.
As you heat the roux, you are slowly toasting the flour in the oil. It will start out as a yellow paste, but as you cook it the color will get darker. The goal is to get a rich chocolate brown without burning the flour. This can be tricky. My advice is to keep the heat low, which takes longer, but avoids the problem of overcooking. Once you get good at it and know what you are looking for, you can use a higher heat setting and go a bit faster. An experienced gumbo cook and get a good roux in about 10-15 minutes. Going slow will take twice as long, but this is not a big deal because you have a lot of cutting and chopping to do and this can be done while the roux simmers.
The next step, once the roux is good and dark, is to begin adding the Holy Trinity. Rather than an invocation of the Almighty, the Holy Trinity refers to the three ingredients considered crucial to any gumbo – onions, bell peppers, and celery. You will need 2 large onions, 2 green bell peppers, and 4 ribs of celery, well chopped.
When the roux is a deep chocolate brown (but not black), drop in the onions. The onions absorb most of the heat that was cooking the roux, so once the onions are in, the darkening process stops. Cook until the onions are clear, then add the peppers until they are cooked down, and finally the celery.
Once you have the mess of vegetables and roux well cooked, you can get on with the creation of the gumbo. Get a large pot and pour the roux into it. Next, toss in the sausage and chicken.
Now we add chicken stock. Chicken stock is a touchy thing for purist chefs, so I leave you up to your druthers. You can make your own, or buy cans off the shelf. Some people say to buy stock out of the can is a crime against nature, but they said the same thing about homogenized milk and store-bought fertilizer. Some of the best gumbos I have ever had used canned stock. Heavens, my mom used bullion! (And some people use pure water instead of stock, which can work if you add enough chicken and cut up the chicken into small parts, taking care to slice through the bone to allow the full flavor of the chicken to seep into the gumbo. If you use water instead of stock, the gumbo will have to cook for a long time – 4 to 6 hours is best.)
At any rate, add the chicken stock, at least 48 ounces worth. Then add more water if necessary to completely immerse the chicken pieces. Put in two bay leaves, a teaspoon of thyme, about a half a cup of chopped parsley, and the chopped tops of a bunch of scallions. You should also add garlic – in my opinion, the more the better. I have used up the better part of a whole clove before, but for the nonce I will advise at least 6 toes of fresh garlic, finely chopped.
At this point, we reach the fork in the road. Democrat or Republican. Big Endian or Little Endian. Rock or Country. Horses or Nascar. The issue is okra. Okra is hot-pepper-shaped vegetable originally from Africa that grows throughout the Deep South. It is suffused with a gummy material that, when cooked in gumbo, thickens the roux considerably. Although the word gumbo comes from the African word for okra, not all gumbos have okra in them. Okra has a mild but distinctive taste which some gumbologists do not like. As I will explain later, there are other ways to thicken your gumbo than with okra, so the choice is yours. You can put it in (if it is available in your area) or leave it out. Usually I leave it out, but my wife likes to put it in. So today we are putting okra in: 2 pounds worth. Don’t worry, it cooks down. Stir the gumbo regularly to allow the okra juice to blend in with the gumbo.
Now for the important part. Gumbo requires Cajun seasoning, and this can be done in a number of ways. The easiest is to buy one of the Cajun seasoning mixes available in the store, and this is not a bad solution. I have done it many times. The best is Tony Chachere’s, which is fairly widely available. If you want to do it yourself, try 1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, 1 teaspoon of black pepper, 1 teaspoon of white pepper, and salt to taste. I would probably use more than that amount, but until you have tried it and are comfortable with very hot food, I would hold back. You can always add more later.
Bring the whole pot to a boil, and then immediately reduce it to a simmer. Cook it at least 2 hours. After an hour or so you can taste it to see if the seasonings are right, then add more as needed. Stir the pot periodically so the ingredients can get to know one another.
Although gumbo is very good fresh, it is even better on the second day. Somehow the seasonings mellow and marry, and a good flavor turns into a great one. Even if you serve it up on the day you make it, hold a reserve back for the next day. You won’t be sorry. Once you have cooked it several hours, allow it to cool, then place it in a refrigerator overnight. The next day you can skim off the layer of fat that will accumulate on the top, making it a little more acceptable to your family physician.
Gumbo is always served on rice. Louisiana long grain is generally preferred, but here I admit my idiosyncrasy – I like Indian Basmati rice. Basmati is a thinner, lighter grain, that tastes less starchy and is almost never sticky. One billion Indians can’t be wrong. Unlike gumbo, rice ages terribly and must be freshly cooked. The rice cuts the spice of the gumbo, if you accidentally put in too much cayenne. I think the gumbo:rice ratio should be about 1.5 to 1; in other words, use lots of rice.
There are stories of Louisiana soldiers who were sent back from the Army during World War I because they refused to eat potatoes instead of rice. Rice is a beautiful thing.
Finally, if you did not use okra in your gumbo, you can thicken it at the time of service with filé. Filé (pronounces FEE-LAY) is a product of the sassafras root. It sprinkles on like any other seasoning, but has no real flavor other than its alteration in the texture of the gumbo. (Some say it has a delicate, root beer like taste, but I find it is overpowered by the rest of the gumbo.) You should be able to get filé anywhere Cajun seasonings are found. Can filé be used with okra? Sure, if you want to be an apostate . . . . Well, actually whatever you want is fine, but since the okra has thickened the gumbo already and the filé has no real flavor, you are not accomplishing anything.
Ambience and Accompaniment
If I have been successful in my persuasion, you are cooking gumbo not just for yourself but for a mess of people. If so, you will need the proper ambience. First, beverages. Cajuns have never been too particular about spirits, and most of them couldn’t tell a red wine from red vinegar, so there are no specific recommendations to pass on. Most Cajuns believe gumbo goes best with beer. Perhaps because we are dealing with chicken, a white wine would be an option, but with its complex flavor I would go for a lighter red wine, perhaps a Merlot. A Cabernet if you really juiced it up with spices.
Now for music. If you are going to have friends over for gumbo, put some Louisiana music on, for crying out loud. There is a huge selection to choose from, and something for every taste. If you want truly authentic Cajun music, try Beausoleil. They are about as straight from the bayou as it comes. If you want something more upbeat, Buckwheat Zydeco combines Cajun music with a rock beat (which is what Zydeco music is). For a more urban sound, the Meters or the Neville Brothers represent the best of main line New Orleans funk. Like jazz? Try the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Contemporary rock? The Iguanas or the Subdudes.
But like a gumbo, which has a little of everything in it, the best accompaniment is a compilation CD set, and here I strongly recommend “Doctors, Professors, Kings & Queens: The Big Ol’ Box of New Orleans.” This is the ideal New Orleans box set, with something for absolutely everyone. (If you go to Amazon and look this title up, you can read my review of this collection.)
I ordain you a minister of Cajun cuisine. Put on the music, ladle out the gumbo, pour the wine and beer, and admire your creation. What you see is not just food. It is one of the mainstays of my life.