Even playing fast and loose with ingredients, results are festive - Jacksonville Journal-Courier

By Angela Bauer, abauer@myjournalcourier.com

Published 5:45 pm CST, Tuesday, February 9, 2021

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  A blend of chopped red, orange and yellow peppers fills in for green peppers in an impromptu gumbo-making session.

  A blend of chopped red, orange and yellow peppers fills in for green peppers in an impromptu gumbo-making session.

  Photo: Angela Bauer | Journal-Courier

Photo: Angela Bauer | Journal-Courier

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A blend of chopped red, orange and yellow peppers fills in for green peppers in an impromptu gumbo-making session.

A blend of chopped red, orange and yellow peppers fills in for green peppers in an impromptu gumbo-making session.

Photo: Angela Bauer | Journal-Courier

Even playing fast and loose with ingredients, results are festive

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Sometimes, you really want to attend Mardi Gras in New Orleans.

Sometimes, there’s a pandemic raging, Mardi Gras is largely canceled and, even if it weren’t, travel’s not the safest of life choices.

(And, sometimes, you pretend a pandemic’s the only thing stopping you from living it up in New Orleans for Mardi Gras. It may not be, but you can pretend; might as well make some use of a pandemic.)

Getting to the Big Easy might not be so easy this year, but it is possible to invite a bit of New Orleans into your home without violating social-distancing guidelines.

I tend to be a dessert-first kind of person, likely to know what dessert is in my future well before I know even options for the main course. That means my annual Mardi Gras food quest usually makes it only as far as pulling out a favored King Cake recipe.

When this year’s Mardi Gras cravings rolled through my mind on elaborate mental-image floats, I was determined to let King Cake pass by. The parade finally halted on gumbo and, with a few substitutions, I was able to pull off something that made a flavorful change in a sometimes pandemic-weary dinner menu rotation.

I started with my go-to gumbo recipe, Terri Pischoff Wuerthner’s “Chicken and Andouille Sausage Gumbo” from her “In a Cajun Kitchen” cookbook. Except I didn’t have any Andouille sausage and I didn’t have fresh chicken, or even a rotisserie chicken. Still, it quickly became just “Chicken Gumbo” after I found a couple of cans of cooked, canned chicken breast meat.

I also didn’t have the called-for green pepper, but I did have red, orange and yellow peppers in my freezer. I didn’t have the called-for okra, but I’m not a fan, so leaving it out wasn’t heartbreaking. And, while I had onion I could have diced, onion powder was quicker. The original recipe calls for added salt, but I left it out. Between the salt in the canned chicken and the salt in the chicken broth, I didn’t think it would be missed, especially not with the other flavors along for the ride.

It’s probably not going to earn any beads from a NOLA native, but it’s worth a go-cup — or a stay-at-home-cup — when even getting to the grocery for ingredients not immediately at hand can be a challenge.

•••

Chicken Gumbo

adapted from “In a Cajun Kitchen”

24 ounces cooked, canned chicken breast meat (or 2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into ½-inch cubes)

1 teaspoon paprika

½ teaspoon black pepper

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

½ cup corn oil

½ cup all-purpose flour

1½ tablespoons powdered onion (or 1½ cups diced onion)

1 cup chopped red, orange and yellow peppers (or 1 cup chopped green pepper)

2 quarts chicken stock

¼ teaspoon Tabasco sauce

2 cups cooked rice

Chopped parsley for garnish

Drain the canned chicken and put it in a bowl; season with paprika, black pepper and cayenne pepper, stirring to combine spices. Set aside.

In a large, heavy stock pot, heat the oil over medium heat; add flour and cook for 20 to 30 minutes, stirring constantly, to make a medium (peanut butter-colored) roux. Be careful to adjust the heat so the roux doesn’t burn, and don’t try to rush the roux-making process. Neither you nor the roux will be happy with the outcome.

Add onion powder and chopped peppers to the roux and cook for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the seasoned chicken and cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly.

Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Add the Tabasco sauce, reduce the heat to low and cover the pot. Simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

Cook the rice.

Remove the pot from the heat and dish it up. Serve in soup bowls with a mound of rice in the center of each portion. Sprinkle parsley — fresh, if you have it; dried, if not — on top as a garnish.

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Even playing fast and loose with ingredients, results are festive - Jacksonville Journal-Courier
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