Tuesday 21 February
Tonight was Mardi Gras, so the Tulane alumnus and the woman who never met a parade she didn't like put on their beads, brought out the Queen Ida and Neville Brothers albums, and gingerly two-stepped across the floor (our record player skips if we're too bouncy).
Dora, of course, was eager to get her share of beads too.
Just for a change, we decided to make a chicken Jambalaya. Wikipedia says that Creole jambalaya has tomatoes and Cajun jambalaya doesn't. There are as many recipes out there as there are cooks, but Emiril does the most straightforward, and it's Cajun.
Of course we edited a bit...okay, a lot. We used garlic as well as the Cajun triad of onion, celery, and bell pepper; added thyme with the other spices; and used one hot and one mild andouille, plus diced Schad's ham as additional tasso. We left our 7 chicken thighs with bone and skin on, for extra flavor. We don't mind knifework, or licking our fingers.
We cut the rice to a third (1 cup raw), because it was way too much for just two of us. We treated it like risotto, toasting the grains and then adding liquid, but the result didn't cook evenly, and some grains remained opaque even until it overcooked at 45 minutes; the end result was sort of gluey, though tasty. We looked up various fixes, and next time we will hold back the rice until the liquid we pour in for it is at a boil. Also, everyone agrees that after the established cook time is over, you should let the jambalaya stand for 20 minutes.
Nonetheless, it tasted like the real thing, insofar as there is one.
Laissons les bons temps rouler!
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