Roux the Day

A friend and I were discussing food (I know, surprise, surprise) a few months back at the beginning of Sunday School.  It was more than likely fast Sunday.  This friend is from Mississippi and as we discussed Dutch Oven cooking, he talked about how long it had been since he had made gumbo.  As we continued talking (and salivating, might I add) about gumbo, my friend told me that he thought that dutch oven cooking and gumbo were a natural match.

As Mardi Gras approached, we decided that we could celebrate by cooking up a big pot of gumbo.  Then we realized that Fat Tuesday, being a Tuesday, would be a bad day to attempt a gumbo.  Gumbo takes a while to cook.

If you're not familiar with gumbo, you can check out the Wikipedia article here.  For the less curious among you, I'll summarize:

Gumbo is a type of stew that originated in Louisiana.  It's uses stock, "trinity" (celery, onion, and bell pepper in Louisiana), meat or shellfish, and some sort of thickener.  It's the thickener that makes the gumbo what it is.  It's usually a roux made of flour and some sort of fat, okra, filé powder (sassafrass leaves, dried and ground), or a combination of the three.  Gumbo actually combines culinary influences from several cultures: French, Spanish, German, West African, and Choctaw.  The name comes either from the African word for okra (ki ngombo) or the Choctaw word for filé (kombo).

There are two main varieties of gumbo.  Creole gumbo usually has tomatoes, shellfish, and a thickener.  Cajun gumbo is based on a dark roux and is spicier.  It can contain shellfish or fowl.

My friend described the dark roux and talked about a chicken and sausage gumbo, so it was pretty clear that he was talking about Cajun gumbo.

We finally got together on Saturday, armed with his mother's gumbo recipe, a pile of ingredients, and my dutch oven equipment to give it a try.

The recipe (with pictures), if you're interested, can be found on dutchovenchef.com.

The roux was the most fascinating part of the process.  It was made of nothing but vegetable oil and flour that is cooked until it darkens to a nice chocolate brown color.  As I continued to stir, it became progressively darker in color and smelled more and more like chicken frying, minus the smell of the actual chicken.  I could feel the heat radiating from the Dutch oven, so I knew that it was getting hotter and hotter and the flour became darker and darker as it toasted in the hot oil.

Without the roux, the gumbo would just be another pot of soup.

In the end, we had a savory, spicy gumbo that disappeared way too quickly.  I ate the last of it for lunch yesterday.  I'm definitely going to make it again.

But the best part of the day, for me, was both learning something new (how to make gumbo) from a good friend while being able to teach him something new (dutch oven cooking).  The only thing to "rue" on Saturday was that the day ended.