Roux

Ok so one of my absolute favorite restaurant dishes ever is the gumbo at Lucille's BBQ. It's not for everyone though. I love the dark taste. It's darker than a lot of gumbos or jambalayas I've had, but my friend got it once and made a face immediately, saying it was too bitter. Anyway if I recall correctly, it has sausage, chicken, and shrimp... No okra or any obvious vegetables, although there's probably onion and/or celery or something along those lines that went into the making of it.

But after ordering it for the umpteenth time yesterday, I decided it is time to attempt to make this gumbo for myself. Apparently one of the ingredients is this thing called roux, which comes from the French word "rouge" which means "red." People make it by heating up equal parts of fat and flour, being careful not to burn it, until it achieves the desired color, which can vary from blond to peanut butter to dark brown. This thing took me 2.5 hours because I was overly conservative and had this on really low heat so as not to burn it and have to start over. I had two batches going and found out it was hard to pay attention to both, so I ended up focusing on one until it was dark brown, and just got tired of watching the other so I settled for the peanut butter variety on that one.

I guess we'll see what the gumbo tastes like, after I pick up the other ingredients for it. Not sure what I'm going to use the lighter roux for... maybe just throw some in randomly when doing roasts or stews. One thing is for sure... I'll probably not make roux again since it takes way too long, unless I decide to try again after getting a cast iron pan. Either way, $10 for a decent portion of my favorite gumbo doesn't seem so bad, especially with free sweet biscuits and apple butter...