It isn't gumbo...

[alexpgp]

... but it'll do.

Lessons learned:

1. Find a source for filé. If for no other reason, what I made is not gumbo because there is no filé in the as-built recipe.

2. Don't ever use imitation crab meat for anything involving cooking. The meat tends to delaminate into rather strange shapes. Edible, but it does not resemble seafood after prolonged cooking.

3. I think my unburned roux was beginner's luck. That, and scrimping on heat. The recipe calls for medium heat, I had it on the low side of medium. This, in turn, was a Good Thing, as the use of the flat plate scraper from the utensil holder turned out to be a Bad Thing (it melted, which gave me momentary pause as to what, exactly, is in the roux besides the oil and flour).

Ah, well... cooking - like life - is often a Great Experiment.

Cheers...

Comments

[rillifane.livejournal.com]

1. Filé can be found in most grocery stores here in Dallas. I bet you it can found down in Houston if you look around the margins of the spice section of your local supermarket.

2. Don't use imitation crab meat for anything involving eating for God's sake!!! I fear for your life if you're eating that kind of dreck.

3. You will defintely do better with the roux with low heat and long cooking. And please use a wooden spirtle. Melted plastic compounds in the roux is a scary thought.

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

There are stores in Houston where one must move aside the containers of Louisiana spices (including filé) in order to get at the other food. If I persist in my experiments in gumbo, I shall call upon my daughter to send some to me here in filé-challenged Colorado.

Thanks for the tip on imitation crab. After watching it fall apart in the gumbo, I've kind of lost my taste for it.

And I'm ahead of you on using wood instead of plastic, though I suspect the worst I'm in for is a little extra, um, roughage in the diet.

Cheers...

Re:

[rillifane.livejournal.com]

For some reason I thought you lived in Houston.

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

Easy enough to get that impression. Despite moving back to Colorado from Houston last January 1, I spent a good chunk of the year down there working as a subcontractor for a NASA contractor.

Cheers...

[volkris.livejournal.com]

There's nothing at all wrong with a dark roux. You get a very different kind of gumbo, but with the right other ingrediants it's a very pleasant thing. Mainly, a darker roux will work well with less complex lists of other ingredients. If you have a dark roux and a stock as a base the other ingredients become less complicated.

Personally, my favorite gumbos don't involve crab at all. Shrimp and oyster gumbo is one of my all time favorite dishes.

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

One of the best gumbos I've had is served at Tommy's Patio Restaurant on Bay Area Boulevard in Clear Lake, just a few hundred yards from JSC. The consistency of the soup itself is quite watery, but the color is very nearly black and taste of the soup is very striking.

I have nothing at all against a dark roux. I just don't (yet) have enough experience with making gumbo to tell when dark enough is dark enough!

Thanks for the tips.

Cheers...