I bought this book as a part of three, the other two (African, Indian) I’ve already cooked from as part of this project. Classic Cajun: Hot and spicy Louisiana cooking, with a foreword by Rube Le Bois is not a book that my capsicum allergic, vegetarian housemate could partake of. All but one vegetable recipe contained capsicum (including the roast potatoes), which I thought was great, so we saved this book for a night when my housemate was not around.
The recipes themselves are well put together, and the results are delightful – well except for one dish which I found quite bland in comparison to the others. I’ll happily re-make two of the recipes I cooked from this book, and will investigate it for other tasty recipes, when my capsicum allergic housemate is visiting other people. Overall I give this 3 out of 5 star.
Chicken Sauce Piquante
Ingredients:
- 4 chicken Marylands
- 75 ml/ 5tbsp oil
- 1/2 cup plain flour
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 celery sticks, sliced
- 1 green pepper, seeded and diced
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 bay leaf
- 1/2 tsp dried thyme
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano
- 1 – 2 red chillies, seeded and finely chopped
- 400g can tomatoes, chopped, with their juice
- 300ml chicken stock
- salt and ground back pepper
- watercress to garnish
- boiled potatoes, to serve
Method:
- Halve the chicken legs through the joint, to give eight pieces
- In a heavy frying pan, fry the chicken pieces in the oil until brown on all sides, lifting them out and setting them aside as they are done.
- Strain the oil from the pan into a heavy flameproof casserole. Heat it and stir in the flour. Stir constantly over low heat until the roux is the colour of peanut butter.
- When the roux reaches the right stage, add the onion, celery and green pepper and cook, stirring for 2 – 3 minutes.
- Add the garlic, bay leaf, thyme, oregano and chillies. Stir for 1 minute, then add the tomatoes with their juice.
- Gradually stir in the stock. Ad the chicken pieces, cover and leave to simmer for 45 minutes, until the chicken is tender. If there is too much sauce or it is too runny, remove the lid for the last 10 – 15 minutes of the cooking time and increase the heat a little to concentrate the sauce.
- Check the seasoning and serve, garnished with watercress and accompanied by boiled potatoes.
Notes on this recipe:
- It is really really really tasty. I didn’t serve it with potatoes (and I don’t know where to get watercress), but the sauce in this dish worked when blended with everything else on the table. Ours burnt a bit, and I’m not sure whether that was the recipe’s fault or because the simmer I had it at was too high – despite it burning slightly, it still tasted amazing. Have I mentioned how amazing this tasted yet?
- It would seriously work with boiled potatoes, even mashed potatoes.
Maque Choux
Ingredients:
- 50g butter
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 1 green pepper, seeded and diced
- 2 large tomatoes, skinned and chopped
- 450g frozen sweetcorn kernels, thawed.
- 120ml milk
- salt, ground black pepper and cayenne pepper
Method:
- Melt half the butter in the large pan and soften the onion in it, stirring regularly over a low heat for about 10 minutes until it begins to turn a pale gold. Add the green pepper and stir over the heat for a further minute, then add the tomatoes and leave to cook gently while preparing the sweetcorn.
- Put the sweetcorn kernels and milk into a blender or food processor and process in brief bursts to break up the kernels to a porridgy consistency.
- Stir the sweetcorn mixture thoroughly into the pan and cook, partly covered, over a low heat for 20 minutes. Stir regularly, making sure that it does not stick to the base of the pan. If the mixture becomes too dry, add a little more milk. If it rather wet in the latter stages, uncover, increase the heat a little and stir constantly for the last 5 minutes to thicken it.
- Stir in the rest of the butter and season generously with salt, black pepper and cayenne. Serve hot.
Notes on this recipe:
- This was really boring. Ways to improve this dish would be to spend the 45 minutes to properly caramelise the onions – and probably use about 5 onions, use tinned or fresh corn, char-grill the capsicum, and oven roast the tomatoes. I’d also put some herbs in it, perhaps some thyme and oregano to complement the chicken. And now it’s a completely different recipe.
Spoonbread
Ingredients:
- 600ml milk
- 130g yellow cornmeal
- 75g butter
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 3 eggs, separated
- butter, to serve
Method:
- Preheat the oven to 190C. Heat the milk in a heavy-based saucepan. Just before it boils, beat in the cornmeal with a wire whisk. Cook over a low heat for about 10 minutes, stirring constantly.
- Remove the pan from the heat and then beat in the butter, the salt and the baking powder, whisking well until the mixture is completely smooth and the butter has melted.
- Add the egg yolks, one at t time, and beat until the batter is smooth and creamy.
- In a large bowl, beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks. Fold them into the cornmeal mixture.
- Pour the batter into a well greased 1.5 litre baking dish. Bake for 30 – 40 minutes until the bread is puffed and brown. Use a spoon to serve the bread. Hand around butter separately.
Notes on this recipe:
- We drizzled the sauce from the chicken over the bread as we ate it, and it was delicious. The bread was beautifully soft and fragile.
- The butter can be substituted for margarine, but I skipped typing in those bits.
- I will definitely be making this corn bread again.
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