Louisiana Homemade Gumbo

Autry, my husband, is from Mississippi. He has Cajun blood in him and on occasion wants to make something up that I've never heard of before. Now I have heard of Gumbo, but as far as I know I've never seen it before August. I am allergic to seafood and when Autry & I were shopping for the ingredients I told him I didn't think I'd want any of the gumbo once it was made up. He said, "Wait until you smell it and you'll want some." I didn't think so, but when the process was almost finished I was starting to wish I had taken him up on his offer of making me some without the seafood in it. Anyway, this recipe has a fairly long process to it, but it's worth it and MUCH better the next day. If I had been in my right mind I would've taken photos of the process, but really I worked hard on the directions so hopefully that will work. Of course you can always leave a question in the comments and I can ask him about it.

Ingredients

3 frozen boneless chicken breasts

2 15oz. cans chicken broth

2 13oz. pkg. Hillshire Farm Beef Smoked Sausages

2 8oz. pkg. frozen celery

1 16oz. pkg. Pictsweet frozen okra

1 12oz. package frozen extra small shrimp

2 12oz. packages Flake Style Crab Flavored Seafood

2 4.5 oz. boxes Zatarain’s New Orleans Style Gumbo Base

Salt & Pepper

Cayenne Pepper

1 Tablespoon Onion Powder

Directions

1. In a 3 gallon pot place the thawed out boneless chicken breasts. Add in the cans of chicken broth and then fill the pot to a little more than halfway full with water. Place on the stove and bring to a boil over high heat. Cook the chicken for 30-40 minutes or until, when cut open, the inside of the chicken is completely white. Remove the chicken from the broth and put on a plate to cool.

2. While the chicken is boiling, slice up the sausage into chunks and put in a bowl. Let the frozen celery, okra and shrimp thaw out. Once the chicken is removed from the broth pour in the sausage, celery, and okra. Cook until each one is tender. This might take about 10 minutes in boiling water.

3. While the sausage/celery/okra is cooking, shred the chicken up. You can do it in big chunks or really shredded. Add this to the pot when the other three are finished cooking.

4. Stir in the thawed out shrimp and add the crab meat to the pot by breaking it off in chunks and stirring it in.

5. Take some of the boiling water and put it in a large bowl. Using a whisk, slowly pour the gumbo base into the bowl of water, and mix. This is to help keep it from clumping up, because it will clump up if you pour it straight from the package into the gumbo pot. Once you've dissolved both packages of gumbo base in the bowl, pour it all into the main pot and stir again.

6. Add in the salt, pepper, cayenne, and onion powder to taste. (I put 1 Tablespoon as a recommendation for the onion powder but you might like more. It’s all about flavor!)

7. Stir the pot of gumbo up really well. Cover with a lid and set it on a cool burner for 1-2 hours to let the flavors blend. Enjoy!

Notes

~Sausage: the brand of the sausage really doesn't matter, that’s what we were able to find at our Walmart so that’s what we used. I wrote down the specifics so it’d be easier for someone else to find if they were looking for it.

~You can use fresh celery and okra, but you will have to cook it up in a separate pot before you add it to your gumbo pot. We used frozen because it seemed easier in the long run. I put the brand name on the Okra because that’s the only frozen okra we could find that wasn't breaded.

~Crab Meat: As I said with the sausage, this is just what we found at Walmart and used so if something looks better or you have fresh crab meat, by all means use it!

~Gumbo Base: It took use awhile to find the gumbo base, but we eventually did find it on the rice & beans isle. There’s a small section with different boxes of Louisiana foods and the gumbo base was by it. Don’t be confused with the regular gumbo base (which we used) and the gumbo base with rice (which we didn't use). Those are both right next to each other. You’ll want the one without rice if you’re following this recipe.

This Post Was Shared!

• I Gotta Try That Link Party #69