Daring Cooks May 2011: Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

Hey all! So sorry for the absence these last few days. Little Butt and I were spending some quality time with The Hubble before he had to take off to play Army.

But I'm here now, and I have a recipe to beat all recipes for you.

So surely, you can't be too mad at me right?? I mean...this may be my "death row meal" if you know what I mean.

Do you know what I mean??

Haha! If you do, then I want to know what your "death row meal" is. Tell me!!!

Anyway. So, last month, since we were moving, I wasn't able to participate with my beloved Daring Kitchen challenges. But now that we are settled it was on.

And there was NO WAY The Hubble was going to let me pass up this challenge...the boy grew up on the Texas coast and LOVES gumbo. Maybe he should marry it??

Our May hostess, Denise, of There’s a Newf in My Soup!, challenged The Daring Cooks to make Gumbo! She provided us with all the recipes we’d need, from creole spices, homemade stock, and Louisiana white rice, to Drew’s Chicken & Smoked Sausage Gumbo and Seafood Gumbo from My New Orleans: The Cookbook, by John Besh.

I am beyond glad I was able to participate this month because this recipe was well worth it.

I'm honestly considering...well...I'm no longer considering. I'm going to buy the book that this recipe came from.

I have never tried gumbo before. I've tried jambalaya and I'm not really a fan. But gumbo...oh gumbo.

Gumbo has stolen my heart and I'm not sure I'll ever go back!!

I can't believe this is what I've been missing out on all this time.

I followed the recipe as given to us since I've never tried it before. I chose the chicken and sausage gumbo because Little Butt can't eat shellfish.

The flavor was amazing! It was just the right amount of heat. It was so freaking good and I can't wait to make it again.

If you have never tried gumbo, I would highly recommend this recipe. Trust me...you will be as enamored with the stuff as I am! I promise!!!

Thanks Denise, for such a delicious challenge this month. I do believe this is my favorite so far!!

Okie dokie. Stretch out your whisking arm and let's get started!!!

Sprinkle some seasoning on the chicken and set it aside. (I used Tony Cachere's but any Creole seasoning will do, or check The Daring Kitchen for an at home recipe).

Dice up all your veggies.

Now...start the roux! Toss your fat/oil and flour in a thick bottomed pan, I used a dutch oven. Now whisk the heck out of it for about 15-20 minutes.

Until it's this deep chocolate brown.

Toss in the onions and stir them up for a bit.

Now put in the chicken, skin side first, until browned on both sides.

Toss in the sausage and stir it up. (I found a jalapeno smoked sausage)

Stir in the veggies and garlic. At this point, add the chicken stock, thyme and bay leaves. Bring it to a boil then  reduce heat to medium-low to simmer, uncovered, for 45 minutes. (When adding the broth I had to switch to a stock pot because my dutch oven wouldn't hold it all)

After that 45 minutes, dump in the okra, andouille, Worcestershire, file powder, salt, pepper and Tabasco. Now let it simmer for another 45 minutes. About 20-30 minutes before the gumbo was finished, I fished out all the chicken bones and shredded the chicken meat (not that it needed a lot of help since it was already falling apart!).

While the gumbo is finishing up, let's make that rice! Toss some butter and onion in a skillet. Cook until tender.

Add the rice and stir until slightly browned.

Add the chicken stock, salt and bay leave. Cover and cook until all that chicken juice goodness is soaked up into the rice.

Serve a big bowl of the gumbo with some of that chicken flavored rice in there. Add more file powder and or Tabasco sauce if you so choose and enjoy!!!

Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

Retrieved from The Daring Kitchen

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Ingredients:

• 1 cup rendered chicken fat, duck fat or canola oil
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 2 large onions, diced
• 1 chicken (3 1/2 to 4 pounds), cut into 10 pieces
• 2 Tablespoons Creole Seasoning 
• 2 pounds spicy smoked sausage, cut into 1/2 thick slices
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 2 green bell peppers, seeded and diced
• 1 tomato, seeded and chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• leaves from 2 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 3 quarts chicken stock
• 2 bay leaves
• 6 ounces andouille sausage, chopped
• 2 cups sliced okra, fresh or frozen
• 1 Tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• salt, to taste
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• File powder, to taste
• Tabasco sauce, to taste
• 4-6 cups cooked Basic Louisiana White Rice (recipe follows)

Directions:

1. Season the chicken with Creole seasonings while preparing the vegetables.
2. Make sure all of your vegetables are cut, diced, chopped, minced and ready to go before beginning the roux. You must stand at the stove and stir the roux continuously to prevent it from burning.
3. In a large cast-iron or heavy-bottomed pan, heat the chicken fat, duck fat, or canola oil over high heat. Whisk the flour into the hot oil – it will start to sizzle. Reduce the heat to moderate, and continue whisking until the roux becomes deep brown in color, about 15 minutes.
4. Add the onions. Switch to a wooden spoon and stir the onions into the roux. Reduce the heat to medium-low. Continue stirring until the roux becomes a glossy dark brown, about 10 minutes.
5. Add the chicken to the pot; raise the heat to moderate, and cook, turning the pieces until slightly browned, about 10 minutes.
6. Add the sliced smoked sausage and stir for about a minute.
7. Add the celery, bell peppers, tomato, and garlic, and continue stirring for about 3 minutes.
8. Add the thyme, chicken stock, and bay leaves. Bring the gumbo to a boil, stirring occasionally.
9. Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer, uncovered, for 45 minutes. Stir occasionally, skimming off the fat from the surface of the gumbo every so often.
10. Add the chopped andouille, okra, and Worcestershire. Season with salt and pepper, several dashes of filé powder, and Tabasco, all to taste.
11. Simmer for another 45 minutes, continuing to skim the fat from the surface of the gumbo. Remove the bay leaves and serve in bowls over rice. Pass more filé powder at the table if desired.

Basic Louisiana White Rice

Ingredients:

• 1 Tablespoon chicken fat, extra virgin olive oil or butter
• 1 small onion, minced
• 1 1/2 cups Louisiana rice (or other long grain white rice)
• 3 cups chicken stock
• 1 bay leaf
• 1-2 pinches salt

Directions:

1. Put the fat, oil, or butter and the onions into a medium saucepan and sweat the onions over moderate heat until they are translucent, about 5 minutes.
2.  Pour the rice into the pan and stir for 2 minutes.
3. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil.
4. Add the bay leaf and salt.
5. Cover the pan with a lid, reduce the heat to low, and cook for 18 minutes.
6. Remove the pan from the heat, fluff the rice with a fork, and serve.

Sausage and Spinach Stuffed Peppers

Psssst! Do you want to hear a secret?

I like books!

LOL! I know...you probably already know that if you've been hanging around for a while.

But if you haven't...now you know!

Now you are probably wondering what the heck my little secret has to do with these stuffed peppers.

Well. Let me tell you.

I don't just like books. I love books. It's a real problem. Especially when you live in the middle of nowhere (an hour and a half away from the nearest book store!).

Since we are a military family, we tend to move a lot.

In every town I've lived in, I usually start up a book group. Except for here that is.

When we were in Syracuse, NY I had a great book group. It was so much fun to have the ladies come over and we would sit around talking about books, drinking wine and eating great food.

Here's another little reveal of mine. I hated cooking!

The Hubble was the cook in the household back then. He would slave away and make dinner for me and my book group ladies. When we were all happily eating and chatting, he would slink away into the office and play with his music while we continued to do our thing. Wasn't he the sweetest??

One of my favorite things to have him make were stuffed peppers. The man makes a mean stuffed pepper.

Sadly, I haven't had The Hubble's stuffed peppers in years! So when I saw this recipe in Food & Wine magazine I immediately set out to make it. And boy am I glad I did!

These were so flavorful and the stuffing was so moist and just delicious. And what's even better is that they are simple to make as well! A few days after we ate these, I was making our weekly menu and asked The Hubble for ideas. He wanted me to make these again!

And guess what...we are having these for dinner tonight! So I thought I would share them with you so you can enjoy them soon as well!

Here we go...

Ingredients: Peppers (the recipe calls for Italian frying peppers, I used Poblano peppers), white bread, extra virgin olive oil, low sodium chicken broth, Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, pine nuts, an egg, red onion, sausage, fresh spinach, tomato sauce, milk, salt and pepper.

Start by tossing the spinach into a large skillet and cooking it on high heat until it wilts (about a minute).

Once wilted, press all the water out of the spinach then chop it up.

In a large bowl, add the chopped up bread, milk, cheese and egg. Knead it all together to form a kind of paste.

Slice a slit down one side of each sausage and remove the casing. Add the sausage to the bread mixture. Toss in the onion, spinach and pine nuts to the mixture as well. Salt and pepper to taste.

Using your hands, mix everything up together until it is all well combined. And...ummm...don't forget to take off your wedding rings...otherwise you will be cleaning sausage out of the crevices for days afterward. Eeeewwww!

Cut the peppers in half lengthwise. Leaving the stem on the pepper, remove the seeds and membrane from inside the pepper.

Then stuff 'em!!!!

In a very large skillet (hopefully the one you wilted the spinach in, I used an electric skillet) heat your olive oil until shimmering. Then place the peppers, stuffing side down, in the skillet and cook over high heat until well browned, about 4 minutes.

Flip them over and cook for the same amount of time on the back side.

Mix together the chicken broth and tomato sauce. Pour it over the peppers. Cover and cook until the stuffing is cooked through and the peppers are tender, about 5 to 8 minutes.

Serve them topped with extra sauce and accompanied with French bread. Enjoy!!

Sausage and Spinach Stuffed Peppers
Adapted from Food & Wine

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Ingredients:

• 1 (5 oz) bag baby spinach leaves.
• 2 slices white sandwich bread, finely chopped
• 1/4 cup milk (I used skim)
• 1 large egg
• 2 Tablespoons freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
• 2 Tablespoons pine nuts
• 2 Tablespoons chopped red onion
• 1 pound sweet or hot Italian sausage (I used sweet turkey Italian sausage)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 4 large or 8 small poblano peppers
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 cup canned tomato sauce
• 1 cup low-sodium chicken broth

Directions:

1. In a very large skillet, cook the spinach on high heat until just wilted, about 1 minute. Drain and press out the excess water; chop. 
2. In a large bowl add the chopped bread, egg, milk and cheese; knead into a paste.
3. Slice the sausage casing and remove the meat from the casing. To the bread mixture add the sausage meat, pine nuts, onions and spinach. Salt and pepper to taste. Knead all ingredients together with clean hands until well combined.
4. Slice peppers in half lengthwise, leaving stems intact. Remove seeds and membranes. Stuff with meat mixture.
5. In large skillet, heat oil until shimmering. 
6. Place stuffed peppers, filling side down, in skillet and cook over high heat until well browned, about 4 minutes. Flip peppers over and repeat on bottom side, cooking another 4 minutes.
7. Combine chicken broth and tomato sauce, pour over peppers in skillet. Cover and cook until meat is cooked through and peppers are tender, about 5-8 minutes.
8. Serve with sauce and French bread.
9. Enjoy!!