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File Gumbo or 80$ Gumbo Recipe

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Category:
Category:

Ingredients:  
Ingredients:  
Stock:
1 whole chicken cut in 9 pieces
3 sliced carrots
3 celery stalks chopped
1 chopped onion
2 bay leaves

Roux:
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup flour

Fresh veggies set aside in Bowl:
1 onion chopped
3 celery stalks chopped
1 green pepper chopped

2 28oz can chopped or whole tomatoes (good San Marzano are great)

4 knorr chicken bouillon

Spices:
2 tsp paprika
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp Coleman's dry mustard
4 garlic cloves chopped
1 tsp ground thyme
1 Tbsp. oregano

Spices to be used before serving:
2 Tbsp. File' (ground sassafras leave)
1/2 tsp Mace

1 lb. Andouille sausage sliced 1/4 inch slices
1 lb. or more crab meat
2 lbs. shrimp

Cooked Rice

Directions:
Directions:
Stock:
Put chicken and ingredients below in a pot and cover with water. Boil for 1/2 hour. Remove chicken to cool. Remove all boiled veggies from stock and save. Save stock ( will yield about 10 cups). You can skim any unwanted fat off of the broth.

1 whole chicken cut in 9 pieces
3 sliced carrots
3 celery stalks chopped
1 chopped onion
2 bay leaves

Roux:
In large pot that will be your final gumbo, start by making a mildly dark Roux with the vegetable oil mixed with the flour. DO NOT LET THIS BURN. Then saute 1/2 of the fresh veggies that were set aside for 1-2 minutes in the Roux. Add and saute the other 1/2 of the veggies for an additional 1-2 minutes.

Reduce heat. Stir in all of the spices. (except File" and Mace). Add saved chicken stock and the 4 bouillon cubes slowly to Roux mixture to desired thickness. Now we are cooking and this is becoming Gumbo!

Turn up heat to slow boil, add canned tomatoes, sliced sausage, 2 bay leaves. and the reserved boiled veggies. Simmer so the sausage flavors the gumbo for at least 1/2 hour.

Tear chicken off bones into chunks. Add to Gumbo. Add crab and shrimp to the gumbo and simmer for a while.

Add File' powder and mace towards end of simmer and before serving. You can add Tabasco if you like it spicier

Serve in bowls over white rice.


Number Of Servings:
Number Of Servings:
15
Preparation Time:
Preparation Time:
2-3 hours
Personal Notes:
Personal Notes:
Cornbread is a nice accompaniment to this dish. Chapman's recipe. Like a chili, this gets better the next day.

The original recipe had you adding the pieces of cut up chicken to the gumbo when you served it. It was a nice presentation but a bit of a pain dealing with pulling apart chicken meat off a bone in your gumbo. So I just pull off the meat and add it.

You also have to be careful with how you handle the crab and chicken. The more you stir and simmer the gumbo the more the meat shreds and although the taste is the same, you can't tell the crab from the chicken since it nothing but shreds. I try to use bigger chunks and not assault the gumbo too much with the stirring.

 

 

 

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