Creole/Cajun Cooking-Corporal’s Kitchen

Joined
Jul 12, 2007
Location
Aledo, IL
Corporal’s Kitchen-Creole/Cajun Cooking

This month, we feature foods from the Cajun and Creole folks of Louisiana! Despite the fame of Louisiana Hot Sauces, Cajun and Creole food is not, for the most part, “hot”. It is, however, very flavorful, containing many seasonings, spices and the “Holy Trinity” (onions, celery and Bell Pepper).

Cajun cuisine arose from the more rustic, provincial French cooking adapted by the Acadians to Louisiana ingredients. On the other hand, the cooking of the Louisiana Creoles tended more toward classical European styles adapted to local foodstuffs. Broadly speaking, the French influence in Cajun cuisine is descended from various French Provincial cuisines of the peasantry, while Creole cuisine evolved in the homes of well-to-do aristocrats, or those who imitated their lifestyle. Although the Creole cuisine is closely identified with New Orleans culture today, much of it evolved in country plantation estates before the American Civil War.

All recipes are from What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, By Abbey Fisher, 1881

Creole Chow Chow

One gallon of green tomatoes, sliced thin, half dozen silver skin onions; sliced thin, one gallon wine vinegar, two tea-cups of brown sugar, one tablespoonful of cayenne pepper, one tablespoonful black pepper, one tablespoonful of tumerick. Put the onions and tomatoes together in a keg or jar and sprinkle over them one pint of salt and let it so remain twenty-four hours, then drain.

Jumberlie--A Creole Dish

Take one chicken and cut it up, separating every joint, and adding to it one pint of cleanly-washed rice. Take about half a dozen large tomatoes, scalding them well and taking the skins off with a knife. Cut them in small pieces and put them with the chicken in a pot or large porcelain saucepan. Then cut in small pieces two large pieces of sweet ham and add to the rest, seasoning high with pepper and salt. It will cook in twenty-five minutes. Do not put any water on it.

Chicken Gumbo

Salt and pepper chicken before frying it. Take a chicken, seperating it from all the joints and breaking the bones, fry the chicken in one and a half tablespoonful of lard or butter. First well mix the chicken in dry flour, let the fat be hot, put chicken to fry until brown; don't burn chicken. After fried put it on in soup kettle with half a gallon of hot water, one and a half quarts of green ochre cut into thin pieces, throwing the end away, and let the whole boil to three pints; season with pepper and salt. Chop half of an ordinary sized onion fine, and fry it with chicken: chilli pepper chopped fine if added is nice when liked.



Oyster Gumbo Soup

Take an old chicken, cut into small pieces, salt and black pepper. Dip it well in flour, and put it on to fry, over a slow fire, till brown; don't let it burn. Cut half of a small onion very fine and sprinkle on chicken while frying. Then place chicken in soup pot, add two quarts water and let it boil to three pints. Have one quart of fresh oysters with all the liquor that belongs to them, and before dishing up soup, add oysters and let come to a boil the second time, then stir into soup one tablespoonful of gumbo quickly. Dish up and send to table. Have parsley chopped very fine and put in tureen on dishing up soup. Have dry boiled rice to go to table with gumbo in separate dish. Serve one tablespoonful of rice to a plate of gumbo.
 
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