Re: Calling all cooks
Here's a few of my favorite cajun dishes.......
Sauce Piquant
Sauce Piquant is a style of cooking used for rabbit, duck, alligator, chicken and seafood. Just about anything you can dream of has been used to whip up a sauce piquant.
A sauce piquant is tomato based using a combination of whole, stewed, sauce and paste, and, uses a small roux. As the name suggests the dish is a little spicy by nature but you can control this yourself. The word piquant means "pricking" in French, like a rose bush thorn. The meat is usually browned (not the seafood dishes), the roux follows and then come the onions, garlic, tomatoes and spices. The Louisiana home style of doing this dish demands that the sauce be cooked a couple of hours on a low fire. This is done to sweeten the tomato flavors, and with wild game, you need to cook it longer to tenderize the meat. The flavor is full bodied tomato and believe me you'll love it.
Sauce piquant is served on hot rice.
Enjoy...
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Stuffed flounder
Tis naturally a South Louisiana favorite. It's a little trouble but boy is it all worth it!
3/4 lb. butter
1 lb. crab meat (you can use chopped shrimp or crawfish also) or a mixture
1/2 cup chopped parsley (save several leaves for garnish)
3/4 cup green onions chopped
3 cloves garlic minced
2 tsp. lemon juice
1 cup bread crumbs
2 eggs
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4 medium flounder (2 lbs. each)
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Mix the following for your baste:
1/4 lb. melted butter
1 tsp. lemon juice
Hot sauce
Scale and clean flounder and wash. With a filet knife make a slit down the backbone then gently fillet meat away from the rib bones almost to the fins making a pocket. Puncture several holes through the ribs almost to the bottom of the flounder. Doing this will allow seasonings to penetrate the meat below the ribs [if you plan on eating that part... I do!].
Use heavy duty aluminum foil and make a boat for each fish. Coat the inside of each boat with cooking spray and set fish in each. Lightly sprinkle Creole seasoning and lemon juice in the pockets you made. Set this aside.
In a pan on a medium fire cook the crabmeat and onion in 1/2 lb. butter. Sprinkle salt and pepper and stir [don't let it burn]. When onions are clear add parsley, green onions, garlic and 2 tsp. of lemon juice. Stir, cover and cook for another 5 minutes. Remove from fire and allow to cool a few minutes uncovered.
Beat eggs and add to above along with bread crumbs; mix well. Sprinkle with Creole seasoning and mix.
You'll bake these in the center rack of the oven. Light the oven and set to 375ºF.
Take the flounder and spoon the stuffing into the pockets. Place fish in oven and cook for 30 minutes. Baste twice while cooking.
Take out and cover pan for about 10 minutes, garnish with lemon slices and parsley.
If you choose to eat the meat below the rib bone pocket be aware that there are fin bones you should move away. You can then lift the entire backbone with ribs and dig in.
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GUMBO
Gumbo is king in Louisiana. Heartwarming and flavorful, a gumbo can cure most Louisiana ailments like hunger-a-tosis, cold-to-the-bone-eolus and alcohol excessaria. Gumbo (Louisiana Love) is the dish the soul soaks up, and remember, Sunday is always "Gumbo Day"! Cold weather is called "Gumbo Weather" in South Louisiana but wait!
Making traditional Gumbo is not for you "fast food" cooks. This dish can take two or more hours. Most of the time is dependent upon making the roux. The more practice you get the faster you'll make them. If you don't LOVE to cook don't even mess with this one! Instead, go to mama's and get yourself a bowl! You can cheat and get pre-packaged gumbo mixes of which many are pretty good.
Besides the roux, the gumbo stock is the base for the great flavor.
Roux
The roux is the base of texture and flavor for the gumbo. It takes practice so if you burn a few don't quit, just start over. We've all burned our share of rouxs. A roux takes your undivided attention. If you try to do other things while cooking a roux you'll likely burn it.
I use peanut oil because it has a higher smoke point and it lends a little nutty flavor. Vegetable oil, lard, bacon grease and butter are all fine but you'll have to learn to adjust the fire differently for each. Mixtures of these oils are possible too.
A good roux (most flavorful) is almost a chocolate color. There are other roux colors (lighter) but they are for other specific dishes. We're looking for the dark roux for a gumbo.
If you are a beginner start with equal parts of oil and all purpose flour. When you get a little experience under your belt you can reduce the oil, it makes for faster browning. In a sauce pan, pot, Dutch Oven (my choice) or whatever, add the oil and let it heat for a minute on a medium fire. Lower the fire a bit, add the flour and begin stirring with a spatula. Let it cook for 10 seconds then stir again. When your fire is right you'll see the flour brown in slightly darker shades as you stir. If you see a big difference in color your fire is too high. As the roux gets darker you need to lower the fire a little, darker - lower, darker - lower, and so on. Experience will make you better at this.
You can cheat on this by buying already made roux in a jar but I like to make my own.
Gumbo Basics
Once you think the roux is the right color throw in the onions and stir for a few minutes. You can then turn the fire up a little and continue adding your other vegetables. Cook this for at least 30-60 minutes. Then add your meat and other favorite gumbo ingredients.
The gumbo must boil a few minutes to obtain the maximum thickening of the flour (roux).
Start your gumbo early. If it sits on the stove an hour or so before you serve it it'll be even better.
Green onions and parsley go in about 15 minutes before turning the fire off. Thyme is an essential seasoning in gumbo!
Add file' after it's done and the fire is off.
Here's some of the different types of meat you can use.
Chicken
There are a few different methods in using chicken and hens.
If you use a chicken (fryer) you can cut it up and throw it in as is. You can cut it and pan fry it until it's lightly browned (adds more flavor) and toss it in. You can boil and de-bone it. You can even de-bone it, pan fry it then throw it in.
A hen is tougher (it's an older chicken and has more experience running from gumbo cooks!) and will take anywhere from 2 to 4 hours to get tender in boiling water. I usually boil and de-bone it. You can cook it in the gumbo but then you have small bones to contend with. You say, well I have bones in the fryer! Yes, but to get the thicker pieces of the hen tender you wind up over cooking the thinner and bonier parts and they will fall apart first, bingo, small bones everywhere.
Sausage
If you're going to make a gumbo using smoked sausage you have a few choices on how to treat the sausage depending upon how much meat you want in the gumbo. Smoked sausage can overpower a gumbo. I feel only andoullie sausage is perfect for gumbo since it has very little grease in it.
Okra
I sometimes throw in a cup of fresh, large cut (1/2") okra about 30 minutes before serving. A true okra gumbo actually doesn't use a roux. The okra is lightly browned and after all is said and done you have a thick gumbo with a good color and magnificent taste. Get ready to spend some time at the stove on this one, but man, it's worth the wait!
Seafood
Shrimp, the large ones, will get tough if you cook them too long. Throw them in about 15 minutes before the fire is shut off. Be sure the gumbo is boiling at a slow roll. Adding a small handful of dried shrimp is an old Cajun trick.
All seafood should cook at least 5 minutes at a slow rolling boil, whole fresh crabs; at least ten minutes.
Rice
Add a little chicken stock to the water you're going to cook the rice in and serve gumbo over rice.
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Bread pudding
9 slices of bread
2 eggs
1 can of Pet Milk
1 cup of milk
3/4 cup of sugar
4 tablespoons of melted butter
1 teaspoon of vanilla
Cut or tear bread into small pieces
Combine eggs, milk, sugar, mix well add to bread, stir well let sit for about 30 minutes
Add butter and vanilla stir well
You may add raisins if you like, I do.
Pour into a buttered 9 by 13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes or until center is cooked.
Serve warm with vanilla ice cream
There this should get you started! 8)
and ribs and chicken shoot im getting hungry just thinking about it.do a beer can chicken theres a thread a little down about it,and KB gave me a good cabbage recipt you take a whole cabage cut the core out put garlic powder and peper down the core with some bacon and pack it with butter then i put 2 slices of bacon over the top wrap in foil and throw on the grill until its tender its some good stuff. and then i fix some macoroni and cheese and pig out.
