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The New Orleans
– Pinetree Connection By Dan Gill We never really
intended to feature Louisiana cooking when we opened as “Something Different”
seven years ago. It all started with coffee and just kinda evolved from
there. We have always
enjoyed the bold taste of coffee with chicory. During most of our married
life, Barbara and I bought cans of French Market from the local grocery store. When they
stopped carrying it, we simply called the American Coffee Company in New
Orleans and ordered it by the case.
We then discovered the pure pleasure of freshly roasted coffee, so
when we decided to open as a specialty food store, we bought a small roaster
and used coffee as a “hook” to get people to come in and try our food. Our
daily feature was “Cajun KickStart”, a blend of high-grown Arabica beans
fortified with a little chicory. We eventually dropped the chicory, being a
little too far North for general acceptance. Our first
non-family employee was Shelley Matrana, a feisty Cajun-Italian from Houma,
Louisiana (yes, I know it’s a redundancy). She made a very good chicken
salad, as she had been taught by her Mama and Grandmamma back home. One day I
got a call from Becky Mercuri, who had written the companion cookbook for the
PBS special on “Sandwiches That You Will Like”. Her publishers wanted to go national
with the American Sandwich book featuring a signature sandwich from each state. When
she got to Virginia, she wanted something with country ham, but didn’t know
what. During her research, she came across my old web pages on how to cure
country ham and what to do with it, and she recognized me from other Internet
discussions of food history and culture. She asked me if we had a special
sandwich for the book. “Of course we do”, I responded, “Give me a minute”.
Shelley and I then tweaked her Louisiana chicken salad to feature our smoked
turkey and country ham and “The Virginia Sandwich” spread was born. The hardest part of
the process was actually getting Shelley to measure. I won’t republish the
recipe here as it was in my first PL article (March-April ’05) and is on our
web page. About the same
time, I decided that the muffaletta would make an interesting addition to our
sandwich repertoire. The muffaletta is the quintessential New Orleans
sandwich created by Sicilian immigrants back in the late 1800’s. The original
version features olive salad, mortadella bologna, capicola (similar to cured
ham), salami and provolone cheese on a large (ten inch across) thin Italian
loaf, usually cut into quarters. The first few times I made them, I baked the
bread on the wood fired pit. I could get it up to about 800°F to make a
perfect muffuletta loaf. One evening, I had the pit fired up and the bread on
when I heard a large motorcycle brake hard, turn around and roar into the
parking lot. It was Jimmy Snead, just back from attending Julia Child’s 80th
birthday celebration in New Orleans. After closing The Frog and the
Redneck in Richmond, he
and his wife toured Southern eateries by motorcycle. He was heading for
Urbanna, smelled the smoke and just had to find out what was cooking. We started out
using commercial bread for our barbecue and burgers, but it tended to disintegrate
about halfway though our juicy sandwiches and customers had to finish eating
them with a fork. Reluctantly, we started making our own buns and sub rolls
out of self-defense. To get the structure and chewy texture, I started with
muffaletta dough, made with a little olive oil, and used whey from making
cottage cheese as the liquid. I no longer have time to make cottage cheese so
we now use powdered whey, which works almost as well. We soon realized that our buns were
well suited for a “mini-muffaletta”. Instead of Mortadella and Capicola, we
use smoked turkey and country ham along with the olive salad, Genoa salami
and melted Provolone cheese on our bun and call it the “Virginia
Muffaletta”. Since we had to
make dough, it was only logical to roll some out in the morning, cut it into
rectangles, fry it in deep fat and sprinkle it with powdered sugar to make
beignets (ben-yay, Cajun doughnut).Good coffee and beignets just naturally
belong together and made Café Du Monde World famous. As a lagniappe (lan-yap, small gift or extra treat), we
often offer a shaker of cocoa to increase the level of decadence. In September of
our second year, Shelley’s brother decided to get married. We closed the
store for a week, loaded everybody into the van and headed for South
Louisiana. We ate and drank our way through New Orleans, then down to Houma
and Lafayette for a real Cajun wedding, and back to New Orleans. We topped
off the trip with coffee and beignets at the Café Du Monde and an original
muffaletta from Central Grocery. This is a culinary pilgrimage that everyone
should make at least once. After we got back home, we came to the realization
that we were doing a pretty good job of bringing the spirit of Louisiana
cooking to Virginia. This year, after
months of research and testing, we have carried the Pinetree-New Orleans
connection to the next level with our own gumbo. As with most Louisiana
cooking, gumbo is more method than recipe and the methods are all about
developing the depth and layers of flavor. There are literally thousands of
versions and variations, but most start with a roux, the heart and soul of
gumbo. Up around New Orleans the roux is fairly light and blond due to the
more refined Creole influence. The deeper you get into the bayous and Cajun
country, the darker the roux gets and the more basic or rustic is the gumbo.
Okra is often added to thicken; tomato is more Creole than Cajun. Gumbo is very
personal: I can tell you how I make mine, but you can’t make mine: When you make it, even using my methods and
ingredients, it becomes yours.
Mine is a Middle-of-the-road gumbo: a little Cajun, a little Creole, a little
tomato, a little okra, a little meat and a little seafood. It is a synthesis
of the best features from the hundreds of recipes that I have reviewed plus a
few little tweaks of my own. For a
five-gallon pot, start with a couple of gallons of good stock –
chicken, shrimp or fish depending upon what kind of gumbo you are making. I
make turkey stock and save the pickings. The stock should be hot before you
start the roux so that you don’t “shock” the roux with cold stock. I add
about a quart of strong coffee for extra depth. While the stock is heating, I
like to oven-roast the tomatoes and seasonings before adding them to the
stock. Roasting brings out the sweetness, depth and umami or “savoriness” of the tomatoes and
brings flavors together better than just simmering. I put about three quarts
(one #10 can) of chopped or chef style tomatoes in a deep pan, add two pounds
of sliced okra and two cans of Rotel Original, then stir in my seasonings and roast @
350°F for about 45 minutes or until bubbly and starting to brown on top. Seasonings
– can also be added directly to the stock. 2 Tbsp garlic ½ C parsley 3 Tbsp kelp
powder (optional, but adds umami - available at our store) 3 Tbsp
Cajun-style seasoning or Old Bay
(I use our Caribbean style mix called KA) ¼ Cup black
pepper ¼ C cocoa ½ C
Worcestershire sauce ½ C fish sauce
(nuok mam) ¼ C Louisiana
hot sauce I like to prep
my vegetables (the trinity) and brown about two lbs of andouille sausage
before starting the roux. Chop three large onions (about four cups), dice one
lb. or three cups of bell peppers, and chop two cups of celery and set aside,
separately. Next heat one
cup of fat or oil (I use rendered turkey fat) in a cast-iron skillet or Dutch
oven until it starts to shimmer but before it smokes, then stir in 1 cup of
all purpose flour being careful to mash out all of the lumps with the back of
a spoon. Keep stirring constantly as the roux darkens to prevent scorching.
Be very careful not to splash any on you, or you will find out why it is
called “Cajun napalm”. You can stop with a blonde roux for Creole gumbo or go
all of the way to a deep chocolate or mahogany for Cajun-style. The darker
the roux, the less thickening power it has. I like mine fairly dark. If you
start getting black specks, you have burned the roux and you have to throw it
out and start all over. Don’t argue, do it! When the roux is
right, add the onions, celery, peppers and andouille, in that order, to stop
the browning. I let them simmer for a few minutes, then put a lid on so they
can sweat until the onions and celery are tender, stirring occasionally to
keep from burning. When you are ready,
carefully whisk the roux mixture into the hot stock. Next add some cooked or
browned meat: alligator, nutria, turtle, or whatever you can find. I use
about two quarts of chicken or turkey from making the stock, broken into
thumb-sized pieces. Smoked meat brings its own personality to the party. I
also puree the turkey cracklin’s left from rendering the fat and add them for
flavor and color. Bring everything to a boil then reduce to a simmer for an
hour or two, or a day – it doesn’t really matter. If you are
making seafood gumbo, add shellfish at the very end of cooking or just before
serving. Shrimp, scallops and oysters over-cook readily and get tough. I add
two lbs of popcorn shrimp just as I turn off the heat. Gumbo is
traditionally served over rice in a bowl. Since we pack in pints and quarts
for retail, it is easier to cook the rice with the gumbo. When you think it
is about done, stir in about three cups of long grain white rice and cook
about 30 more minutes. Adjust water and seasonings to taste. It will thicken
as it is cooled and re-heated. Serve with a
shaker of file' (fee-lay, powdered sassafras leaves) and maybe some chopped
green onion or chives for garnish. Native Americans used sassafras leaves for
seasoning and thickening stews as first reported by explorers on Sir Walter
Raleigh’s early expeditions to North Carolina. Cajuns picked it up from the
Choctaws in Louisiana. In fact, the Choctaw word for sassafras may be the
source of the word “gumbo”, but some think it came from the African word for
okra. In any event, file' is generally not served with gumbos thickened with
okra, but I like how it transforms the flavor, so I use it anyway. File' may
also be mixed with the gumbo just before serving, but don’t cook with it or
it gets stringy. One last
cautionary note: Either keep soups hot (above 140°F) until they are served,
which in some cases may be several hours, or chill to 40°F or less as quickly
as possible. A five-gallon pot of gumbo, or soup, or stock will take many
hours to chill all of the way through in a refrigerator and can grow some
mighty unfriendly critters. I have a tall, small-diameter stainless steel
dairy bucket that I can immerse in an ice bath and roll into the cooler. Some
cooks have a special “cold paddle” to bring the temperature down quickly. You
can also freeze some plastic drink bottles (almost) full of water and stir
them around in your soup pot to chill it before putting it away. Be safe and
enjoy!
© Dan Gill - Published
in Pleasant Living Nov. – Dec. ‘08 Printer Friendly
(MS Word) Also in this
issue: Urbanna
Time: the 2008 Christmas House Tour Something Different Country Store and Deli More Blurbs from a
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