Louisiana Cook’n

---

On tap for today was a cooking class. I have made a few creole dishes but really wanted to get the basics down with this class. The class is a Roux class, the foundation of all good Cajun and creole cooking.

I booked the class several months before the trip. I was a little concerned when I never heard back from them to confirm. I e-mailed two times after making the reservation and finally did get an e-mail confirmation and then they called the week before. I now understand why they didn’t confirm right away. Chef Bond the founder and instructor died suddenly of a heart attack a couple months ago, so they clearly had more important things on their mind than my cooking class.

It all still turned out really well, Chef Aaron, was very knowledgeable and I learned much more than I thought I would.

The class is through the Mardi Gras Cooking Class, located on Algiers Point. Across the Mississippi from New Orleans. It is a quick 10-minute ferry ride across and then a short 2 block walk to the house. The class is taught in a home kitchen, fully equipped and a great center island. This is a fully hands on class, so if you just want to stand around drinking wine, and watch someone cook, hire a private chef. This class is designed for those who actually want to learn something about cooking Cajun/creole food.

The menu for the day was: Bread Pudding with a brandy mocha sauce; chicken and andouille gumbo, and crawfish etouffee. The gumbo is Cajun (one pot country meal) the etouffee is creole. They both use all of the same ingredients, there are two differences, one the roux and the other the amount of cayenne.

As all good chefs will tell you to do, we started with the Bread Pudding. It was so simple and no measurements. The base is day old good French bread, eggs, sugar, vanilla and milk. The bread is hand torn and big chucks so you get layers of texture from ooey gooey to crispy. After that was mixed to insure the bread was coated, we added semi sweet chocolate chips, did another stir, and poured it into the baking dish in to a 350 oven and forgot about it, until we could smell it.

Next was the sauce. So simple again. 1 stick melted butter, powdered sugar to cover the melted butter then four egg yolks. And instead of using your hands to separate or an egg separator, we used an empty plastic water bottle, squeeze place next to the hoke and sucked right in no white. The egg yolks were then incorporated into the butter and sugar and powdered mocha added (a Sandra Lee moment, a short cut as opposed to melting chocolate and brewing coffee), finally brandy to taste all stirred then just let to sit the brandy cooks the yolks and the sauce thickens without any actual time on the stove.

The Prep

With dessert done, we moved on to the base of both dishes. The Roux. But before that we prepped are trinity (basically a mirepoix with peppers instead of carrots). Here is where we both learned are first skill, that we so desperately need. My knife skills are bad, every chef in every cooking class has said so, but this is the first class where we were actually taught how to hold the knife and how to correctly, cut, chop, dice and slice. Makes a big difference when you do a simple thing like hold the knife correctly. We also learned a very quick easy way to cut a bell pepper, no seeding necessary.

After the trinity we prepared our green onions, parsley and garlic. Learning how to chop and mince as we went. The dishes were not shy on garlic, and as we always say, there is just no such thing as to much garlic.

With the prep work done, we moved to the KEY component of the two dishes.

The Roux

The Cajun roux is a dark rough while the creole roux is a blond. The difference comes from the fat and the cooking time. The Cajun roux is cooked much longer and a higher heat so it goes from light to very dark almost burnt. The base is high heat oil and flower (equal parts each). The creole roux uses olive oil or butter (which do you think we used) and equal part flower. It is done over a lower heat until a nice nut-brown color, perhaps a bit lighter. A roux must be stirred continuously, so have your wine ready, as Chef Aaron says you’re going to enter roux land, which means until it is done you are clued at the stove stirring and watching the heat so it does not burn, especially the dark Cajun roux. We both made the Cajun roux, Chef Aaron showed us the fast way, which requires much more carefully attention to your heat and the texture of the roux as you cook. The slower way, to insure not burning, is a slightly lower heat but it takes 45 minutes as opposed to 10. And you must stir constantly, taking it off the heat occasionally so it doesn’t get to thick to fast. The dark roux turned out very good. I then made the creole roux.

Gumbo

To your roux you add the trinity and cook until the onion is transparent. Again, Chef Aaron actually explained how to tell, when you can see the veins of the onion, that is what you’re going for. Next you starting adding your stock two cups at a time, letting it get to just a simmer, stirring occasionally, then adding more until you have the consistency you want. With the second addition of stock the garlic goes in, with the next the parsley and green onions. You then add your chicken and andouille put the lid on and bring to a boil. Wants it boils you reduce to a simmer, until your happy with the consistency. Almost forgot there is also okra in here.

Etouffee

Same process, adding all of the same ingredients and about ¼ of the stock used in the gumbo less. Evidently etouffee means smoother, so after all your ingredients are added (except your crawfish) you cover and let simmer 20 minutes or so half way through adding your protein, in this case crawfish).

That was it, we did all of this in about 3 hours, with two breaks, lots of wine (which gave me a headache as it was not the best pinot grigio I have ever had).

The last lesson was plating. A quick lesson how to add the rice to gumbo and garnish. Then we ate.

Oh yes, let’s not forget the cayenne. The gumbo had to big pinches and I mean big, the etouffee had one added before the dishes were covered to simmer.

Everything tasted really good, the best gumbo we had on the trip and certainly the best etouffee. Jerry liked the etouffee better, as he wanted the gumbo a bit thicker. Easy enough to accomplish, just a thicker roux and less stock.

It was one of the best cooking class I have taken, as I not only learned about cooking but basic kitchen skills that are often over looked.

After lunch we walked back to the ferry and headed back to the hotel. As you get off the ferry on the New Orleans side of the river, there is a Harrah’s, well how could I not gamble. We went it walked around, found the on 3 card poker table. I had $60 on me so knew I had a limit. Doubled my money in 30 minutes and left. I always know when to walk away.

That was the day. We even changed our dinner reservation to the next night as we were pretty full from lunch. We just stayed in the room with Tarragon, I took a nap, then we watched NCIS New Orleans. Jerry turned in early, I ordered a cheese burger as I finally got hungry again.

Tomorrow is the last full day, and it is the do what we missed day.

---