paul prudhomme's gumbo
first make five cups of uncooked white rice and set aside.
then make a stock pot full of 12 cups of water, a stalk or two of celery, and a chopped up yellow onion in quarters. bring that to a light boil and then simmer on low med for thirty mins…this is your water for your gumbo.
after thirty mins…pull out the celery stalks and chopped up onion and discard. leave stock pot on a side burner off heat…
chop 2 cups of celery, 2 cups of yellow onion chopped, and 2 green bell peppers chopped in a bowl…
4 whole bay leaves
4 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
1 tablespoon oregano
2 tablespoons minced garlic
now put 1 and a 1/2 cups of vegetable oil in a skillet (you HAVE to have a wire whisk, preferably a flat wire whisk. after the oil is heated on med heat add slowly 1 and a 1/2 cups of flour into the oil stirring with the whisk quite fast…you don’t want the roux to burn…keep stirring the roux mixture until it turns a reddish brown to dark brown…and pull off heat…stir in the raw celery, onion and bell pepper into the hot roux…what an aroma…keep stirring the roux until the roux is not as hot in five mins or so now stir in the spices, mix good and…now put your stock pot back on the burner and bring to a boil…now add spoonfuls of roux to the stock while you stir the stock water…once all the roux is added to the stock water it will be a dark brown rich thicker broth…
stir in two packages of chopped chicken breast tenders and two packages of eckridge polish sausage chopped into bites…cook on med heat for thirty mins and serve a cup of the broth and a spoonful or two of the chicken and sausage…(you have to dig to get the chicken)…over white rice…serve…enjoy.
