Cajun and Creole Cooking
The Folklore and Art of Louisiana Cooking
by Edie Hand and Col. William G. Paul
Cumberland House, 2007
$22.95, cloth
281 pages
Cajun and Creole cooking is not for the faint of heart, literally and figuratively. The cream, the cheese, and the abandonment to pleasure is more than most metabolisms can take. And you must love spending time in the kitchen. You'll be gathering ingredients, blending spice mixes, chopping vegetables, and stirring roux.
But the flavors that result are worth the trouble and will make any meal an occasion. Rounded and full, sometimes spicy with the distinctive features of sautéed green peppers and thyme, spread by a smoky roux.
The French, Spanish, African-American, and Italian flavors of New Orleans have combined in New Orleans to become one of America's great cuisines and the authors of this book, otherwise know as Miss Edie and the Colonel, are well-versed in its history and traditions.
They begin the book with the essentials and approach that create these distinct flavors, beginning with the Louisiana lifestyle. "In other parts of the country they meat eat, but in Louisiana we dine," they write, summing up the serious and sensual approach to meals. Hand and Paul also attempt to describe la bouche Creole, the particular layered and complex flavors created by seven essential ingredients-roux, rice, spice, stock, trinity, wines and liquors, and sauces.
By providing basic concepts, the authors hope you will be free to experiment, and develop your own bouche Creole. encouraging and complete guidance-two and half pages on roux, the mysterious file explained along with the clearly important trinity-the sautéed onions, celery, and green pepper that are the base of almost every dish.
To further develop your bouche creole, the second part of the book traces the evolution of Cajun and Creole cuisine, created by periods of French and Spanish colonial rule, the in the kitchen expertise of African slave cooks, the waves of immigrants that washed over the region. Hand and Paul describe the difference between Creole and Cajun. They suggest substituting in your mind the word colonial for Creole, people who are not of mixed race, but from the original Spanish colonial settlers. Whatever the bloodline, when applied to food, Creole describes the "fancy dishes with rich sauces" of New Orleans.
The Cajuns are the Acadians who arrived from Nova Scotia, after being ousted by the British. They settled in the bayous and prairies on farming and ranching homesteads. Accordingly, Cajun cooking has a more homespun and traditional taste. The authors describe it as one pot dishes, game, and more herbs than sauces.
Romance, history, and practicality combine in the recipes beginning with all manner of French inspired sauces and finishing with famed New Orleans desserts such as pralines and bread pudding.
Recipes like Louisiana Turtle Soup and Cochon de Lait have the tang and challenge of authenticity. But even the daunting dishes like gumbos, etouffes, and jambalayas are simple once you've assembled all the ingredients, and certainly worth the trouble. A-wouldn't-be-New -Orleans-without-it dish like Cajun "Dirty" Rice is a perfect example of the layered flavors achieved in the simplest home cooking. You could season the trinity with salt and pepper, but why not add the cayenne, white pepper, thyme and paprika of a Cajun spice mix. You could blend the flavors into the folded in cooked rice, but use chicken broth for more dimension, and ground beef added with the chicken livers adds even more flavor.
Congri, an herby stew of black beans similar to the New Orleans standard, Red Beans and Rice is a long simmered stew of dried beans flavored with a ham bone and a bottle of beer. Served with spiced Louisiana Tasty Rice or plain white rice, the dish is deeply satisfying.
Even if you shortcut these recipes, lightening the cream or using canned beans in a bright simmer, you can capture some of the essence of Creole and Cajun intensity, tempting tastes that can lead you deeper into these beguiling dishes, with Miss Edie and the Colonel as your guides.
© 2008 Claudia Kousoulas
