Seafood gumbo (Creole stew)

This is not officially lazy as it took me almost eight years to zero in on the correct way to do it, but now that I have done all that work and it was not my recipe to begin with, I feel that the world needs it.  Really, this gumbo will make the world a better place, or at least you will feel that way when you smell it and dig in.  Tribute to the late Charles Hebert Sr.-

Ingredients

Roux

-1/3 c. butter

-1/3 c. oil

Plus as much flour as that will take, get the oils warm (low heat) and slowly whisk in the flour and just leave it on the back burner whisking occasionally.  A roux developes over time it will go through several colors – pale yellow, amber, brick, brown and then all of a sudden burnt to a stinking mass of garbage.  Stop this one at brick.  It will also get thinner as it sits there and the cooking will accelerate.  Watch it.

4 medium Andouille sausages (NOT CHICKEN!)

1 lb. raw shrimp (I love rock shrimp for this  but they are highly seasonal)

3/4 c. each – celery, sweet onion chopped finely

several cloves of garlic

one package (15 oz. I believe) frozen okra (unfortunately in Seattle you will never find fresh)

1 can black-eyed peas

1 can tomato sauce

1 tsp. or so each – Paprika, cayenne pepper, thyme, black pepper, 1/2 tsp. celery salt, three bay leaves, dash Worcestershire (DASH), Dave’s Temporary Insanity to heat as needed

Peal and chop up the sausage into bite sized pieces.  Place in a skillet over medium-high heat and start browning, it doesn’t need to fully cook.  Add the shrimp without draining (any fishy liquid will actually be great in this).  Again, they don’t need to fully cook.

At the same time, get the fresh veggies and garlic  in a deep pot with some olive oil and start getting them soft over medium-high heat.

Whenever you can’t take the aroma of the sausage-shrimp mixture any more, add about a cup of chicken stock and bring up to barely boiling.  Make sure to scrape the bottom of the pan.

Mix everything.  That is to say, add the sausage-shrimp-stock and roux (which ought to be brick colored by now) to the large pot full of soft veggies.  Add the tomato and spices and the black-eyed peas.  If it seems like there is not enough liquid, add enough chicken stock to cover everything.

Let this simmer and thicken, at least one hour if not two if you can stand it.  I think a younger tempranillo or some sort of syrah would be the perfect wine for this.  I will be posting a photo shortly because now I really want to make this.

A little on the lighter side since I got impatient with the roux and stopped it at what might be called “pecan” in roux parlance.