Shrimp and Sausage Gumbo

So I saw some old shrimp in the freezer and wanted to use them this week but didn’t feel like doing my usual shrimp recipe.  I had a hankering for something tomatoey and slightly spicy with the shrimp, which is funny because I’m usually not a tomato-sauce-with-my-shrimp type of girl.  So it was going to be in the Spanish/Portuguese genre; I thought of paella (this is a great recipe, btw), but I wanted something a) less labor-intensive and b) not using white rice, since I’m on a healthy-eating kick.So I did a search at Epicurious and came up with this recipe for Seafood and Turkey Sausage Gumbo.  I thought it looked easy enough, and it got great reviews from people who had tried it.  I have a nearly-endless supply of deer Italian sausage from my parents’ freezer, so I used that instead of turkey sausage, and I used more shrimp and no catfish, because that’s what I wanted to do.  Also, we were having my mom over for dinner and she is gluten-intolerant, so I substituted brown rice flour instead of all-purpose flour.  I also didn’t want to buy a whole package of Cajun seasoning, so I found some recipes online, settled on this one and then scaled it back, by guesstimating, to the amount I’d need for this recipe (since I didn’t want a ton of leftover seasoning).

We all thought this was very tasty, and JR said, “You can post on your blog that I loved this, and I think you should make it regularly.”  So, I guess it went over pretty well!  I served it over brown rice, and JR added a newly discovered hot sauce (which he also loved) to add some more heat.

Unless you also have access to venison Italian sausage, your gumbo probably won’t turn out quite the same as mine, but it will still probably be pretty tasty!

Shrimp and Sausage Gumbo

based on Bon Appetit’s Seafood and Turkey Sausage Gumbo

1/4 cup flour (all purpose flour, or brown rice flour for the gluten-free)

1 tablespoon olive oil 1 cup chopped onion 1 cup chopped green bell pepper 3 garlic cloves, chopped 1 teaspoon dried thyme 1 bay leaf 3 low-fat Italian turkey sausages (about 10 ounces), casings removed (or 1 lb deer Italian sausage) 1 28-ounce can diced tomatoes in juice 1 cup canned low-salt chicken broth or vegetable broth 2 teaspoons Creole or Cajun seasoning*

15 uncooked large shrimp, peeled, deveined

Sprinkle flour over bottom of heavy large pot. Stir flour constantly over medium-low heat until flour turns golden brown (do not allow to burn), about 15 minutes. Pour browned flour into bowl.

Heat oil in same pot over medium heat. Add onion and bell pepper and sauté until tender, about 7 minutes. Add garlic, thyme and bay leaf; stir 1 minute. Add sausages and sauté until brown, breaking up with back of spoon, about 5 minutes, then add browned flour. Add tomatoes with juices, broth and Creole seasoning. Bring to boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer 20 minutes to blend flavors, stirring frequently.

Add shrimp and catfish to pot and simmer just until seafood is opaque in center, about 5 minutes. Discard bay leaf. Season with salt and pepper and serve.

*based on this recipe, I made my own Cajun seasoning as follows (it was a bit more than 2 tsp, but I wanted a stronger flavor and actually ended up adding more paprika and cayenne as it was cooking):

1 tsp paprika

1/4 tsp ground black pepper

1/4 tsp ground white pepper

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1/8 tsp dried minced onion

1/8 tsp dried thyme

heaping 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

#sausage #spicy

Chicken Noodle Soup

I can no longer bear to throw away a chicken carcass because I’ve discovered that the carcass is like hidden gold; you just need a little work and you get what is perhaps the best part of that chicken: stock.

I’m not going to post on it here, but there are tons of health benefits to eating homemade chicken stock (“stock” is made with the bones, while “broth” is made with just meat — the cooking process with the bones gives you all sorts of good minerals and other healthy stuff — google something like “chicken stock health” to learn more).  I have a great basic recipe that comes from my trusty Better Homes & Gardens cookbook, but there a gazillion good recipes available online.  Also, if you consider that a quart of chicken stock generally costs at least $1.50 to $2, it’s a lot cheaper since stock made from a chicken you were eating anyway is basically free!  (I make most of my stock from Costco rotisserie chickens; I get about 2 quarts from a batch, which I freeze in 4 cup portions.)

I had a chicken carcass with quite a bit of meat left on it from several days after Titus was born.  We didn’t eat all of it and I didn’t have the energy to do anything with it right away, so I just stuck the whole thing in the freezer in a ziploc bag.  Yesterday I pulled it out and threw it in the crockpot with a chopped up onion, some celery leaves, a couple of chopped carrots, a sprinkling of peppercorns, and a couple dashes of thyme, garlic powder and sage (I didn’t have the ingredients to make a good stock, so I just winged it.  “Winged” it?  “Wung” it?  I think “winged” sounds better).  I covered it all with water and let it simmer for a few hours. Then I pulled out the carcass and picked the meat off, and then returned the bones to the pot to simmer for a few more hours.

In the meantime, I used this recipe to make some whole wheat noodles.  You could totally use store bought noodles, but I was feeling ambitious.  In the future I’d cut the recipe in half unless you want a REALLY noodly soup; I made pasta out of about half of the dough.  About 20 minutes before we were ready to eat, I strained the stock, added the chicken and half of an onion, a couple of chopped carrots and some frozen peas.  You could add whatever veggies you wanted; if I’m making wild rice chicken soup instead of noodle soup, I often add some zucchini or green beans.  Yesterday my choices were dictated by what I had on hand.  Just before serving, I added the noodles and let them boil for about 5 minutes.

So, you’re not getting a recipe today, but a general direction — that’s actually one of the beautiful things about soup: once you get down the basic idea and have a goal, you just throw together whatever works, and whatever you have on hand.  And then you eat the leftovers for lunch the next day, which I’m about to do!

UPDATE:  Here is a link to someone else’s simple recipe for stock made from a rotisserie chicken.  And from another blog dedicated entirely to soup — yay!

#chicken #brothbased #noodles

Curried Split Pea Soup

Split Pea Soup is not photogenic; there’s no question about it.  That doesn’t mean, however, that it doesn’t have other very laudable attributes.

I’ve blogged about this soup before, but I made it the other day and thought it was worth mentioning here for several reasons.  One is that it’s a very, very tasty soup: it’s subtle but complex, smooth and I added enough curry to make it a little bit spicy.  Another is that it’s very easy and uses only a few ingredients; I rounded out the meal with some cheese toasts and spinach salad.  Also, split peas are insanely good for you.  Finally, this soup is extremely economical; I didn’t do the math, but I’m betting that it costs only pennies per serving (even less since I used homemade chicken stock, which also adds to the health benefits), and that’s important to me this year as the hubby and I are tightening our belts a bit and living on a tighter budget than we had when I was working full time and he wasn’t yet self-employed.

In case you’re not convinced to make this, here’s what you’re doing for your body when you eat split peas:

1. They are an excellent source of soluble fiber, which means they catch nasty cholesterols.

2. The fiber also helps make you regular and minimizes irritable bowel syndrome and diverticulosis.

3. They are the right kind of fiber to balance blood sugar – great for everybody, and especially for diabetics and hypoglycemics.

4. A bunch of the minerals help your heart.

5. The potassium helps with high blood pressure.

6. A cup of cooked peas has 16 grams of protein! Now that deserves an exclamation point!

7. The isoflavones can help prevent breast and prostate cancer.

8. They have huge amounts of molybdenum, a trace mineral that helps detoxify sulfites, which are a preservative in just about everything.

Curried Split Pea Soup, from Alton Brown

Ingredients

1. 2 tablespoons unsalted butter

2. 1 cup chopped onion

3. Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

4. 1 tablespoon minced fresh garlic

5. 12 ounces dried green or yellow split peas, picked over and rinsed

6. 5 cups chicken broth

7. 1 tablespoon curry powder

Directions

Place the butter into a large (4 to 6-quart) saucepan over medium-low heat. Once melted, add the onion and a generous pinch of salt and sweat for 2 to 3 minutes. Add the garlic and continue to sweat for an additional 1 to 2 minutes, making certain not to allow onions or garlic to brown.

Add the peas, chicken broth and curry powder. Increase heat to high and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and cook at a simmer until the peas are tender and not holding their shape any longer, approximately 45 to 50 minutes. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed. Using care and a stick blender, puree the soup until the desired consistency. Watch out for hot splatters.

#quickandeasy #vegetable