Holiday recipes

The thing about gumbo is it is not very complicated and actually any idiot can make it. To prove this, we made a video. It took longer than a minute, though.



See also in Yellow Blog posts about gumbo recipes:

The Gumbo Z'herbes that, I guess, could be vegetarian if we wanted to but instead is loaded up with pork is at the bottom of this rambling post from Easter Weekend 2010

The Great Big Turducken Gumbo I made in 2011 appears as the lead in to this rambling post about some Saints games from that season.

Gratuitous pictures of gumbo

Remember when we all used to just blog about food and cooking and stuff?  And when we did that, almost everything we made was, like, simple shit that everyone knows how to make anyway. (Like this. This one had food AND football in it. Remember when we used to blog about football all the time?)   It was so quaint.  Who would even want to read that now? 

I mean, sure, the weather is finally getting nice. And we know everybody is making a gumbo. But, geeze, shut up about it already. Nobody has time to deal with an article whose point is just, basically, "let's look at some gumbo now" Right?

Don't get me wrong. We definitely prepared for all of this on Saturday. As we all know, the moment the temperature drops below 60, everyone is required to complete their obligatory gumbo and present it at the Clerk Of Court's office for validation by close of business two weeks hence. We are happy to report that we are in compliance. Would you like to see?



This, unfortunately, is more than we can say for the Junior League-ish organization of Andersonville Georgia who compiled this book of "Receipts" we found in a junk shop last week.



There's a pretty nice smothered okra recipe in there. But I wouldn't pass it off as gumbo.

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Oh also, while we're on the topic of gratuitous and boring food news, congratulations to Chef James Cullen on taking charge of the kitchen at Upperline where he will not be frying any chicken.

Cullen has been known for his fried chicken, which is modeled on the version of the great chef Austin Leslie. Unfortunately, that won't be added to the Upperline menu, not even as a special. The kitchen, he said, is too small. He has, however, been making the fried chicken to feed his staff before the restaurant opens. So if you want to eat Cullen's fried chicken, you'll have to get a job at Upperline.

Luckily, Chef James, seen here catering an LSU tailgate in 2014, does have other talents.  I remember liking the greens a lot.





The Upperline menu is, I guess, you'd call it "traditional" now although the tradition it pulls from is more along the lines of the mid-90s New Orleans bistro. They do have a gumbo, though. 

Gumbo season

It's mid-October and we're all still sweating our ballses off. It looks like we're headed for another Halloween In The Tropics this year. Not sure what that means for your Sexy Ken Bone costume.

Anyway, everybody talks about the weather but nobody does anything about..... (shoot me please.) So this month I've been trying to make fall happen by cooking more gumbo.  A few weeks ago this chicken, andouille, and oyster deal was a major success.  Seriously. That's my favorite one I've made since the Great Turducken Gumbo Of 2011.

This past Thursday I did a gumbo z'herbes very much like the one shouted about toward the end of this podcast episode. Because, you see, there was this local uproar about people putting kale in gumbo. But that was stupid because you can totally put kale in gumbo. People do it all the time. I put it in this one along with several other types of green as well as some smoked pig tails. 



So shut up about kale already. It works fine in the gumbo.  Meanwhile the gumbo cooking hasn't helped the fall weather roll in quite the way we'd like. But we'll keep trying.

It's early but

The weather sort of hinted at maybe wanting to be fall eventually. So we made gumbo just to try and help it along. That's chicken, andouille, and a pint of oysters which goes really well with a smoky sausage.



Anyway, it will probably be 90 degrees again next week but that can't really hurt us anymore. Not this year.