I tried to get all artistic when I plated my red beans & rice on Monday.
I’d give it a B for composition. It looks pretty good but I lose points for not wiping the rim of the bowl perfectly clean. And I dribbled some gravy on the rice. I scraped up the leftover chopped parsley from the cutting board and sprinkled that on with the green onions. I tried to get a sprinkling of Slap Ya Mama seasoning to stick to the rim of the bowl but couldn’t get it to stick whether the edge of the bowl was dry or wet so I just gave up. I’ve seen restaurants do that but I apparently lack the skill.
In the background you can see Louisiana and habanero Tabasco hot sauces. I added Crystal during maybe the last 10 minutes of cooking.
You southerners probably have a better choice of andouille than I do. I use this:
I wouldn’t say it’s exactly authentic but it tastes pretty good, doesn’t cost much, and I can get it close by. I’m not going to start mail ordering andouille from LaPlace. I can find this which is a Louisiana import but it’s $10+ for a package, requires a bit of a drive on roads with just 35 mph and 45 mph max speed limits, and it’s soft and fatty and, while it’s okay, I’m not crazy about it and I’m not sure if it’s worth the price.
Aidells goes $6 for 12 oz. and when I can find it on sale for $4 I stock up and throw a bunch in the freezer. Chopped up it looks like this:
It’s got a nice coarse grain with good fat content. I use it in made-from-scratch Cajun dishes, in boxed mixes from Zatarain’s and Tony Chachere’s, and with jalapeños and pasta.
Emeril’s recipe says to start off browning the Tasso ham. I find it works better to brown the andouille in some bacon grease and let it release its fat.
Then I remove the sausage and toss in the trinity. I’ve seen recipes that call for a 2:1:1 ratio of onions:celery:bell peppers, and others that call for a 1:1:1 ratio. I’ve stopped getting hung up about it. I dice up a pepper, dice up either a whole onion or 3/4 of onion depending on its size, and about 3 stalks of celery. I like to save some onion and pepper, along with some Tasso, to make a western omelette later on.
Here’s the trinity going into the pot:
I added some kosher salt to that. Some Slap Ya Mama too. Here it’s cooked down with garlic added (always use more garlic than the recipe calls for):
I also added the bay leaves Emeril’s recipe calls for a pinch of cayenne. I use a lot more than that. And I added some Creole seasoning that I made from a recipe I found online that’s a mix of paprika, cayenne, onion and garlic powder, and white pepper. I’m pretty sure there’s also dried oregano and thyme in that mix. I also ground some black pepper in there. When it comes to seasonings I’m pretty much just winging it. It turns out great.
I don’t know if I’m getting authentic Tasso ham or not. What do you think? Authentic or not, it’s close enough and tastes great. From what I’ve had at restaurants and seen online, it seems legitimate enough.
I cut that into decent sized cubes, again using more than the recipe calls for. 1/4 cup? More like 3/4 cup. At least 1/2 cup.
I used to be able to get great raw ham hocks that I could smoke myself. The market where I got those stopped carrying them. I’ve had them special order some for me but there wasn’t a lot of usable meat on them. Ham hocks are crucial to any good pot of beans and biting into a succulent morsel of hock meat is always a nice little surprise. What I use now is a locally produced product from Streb’s:
After about 90 minutes of simmering, I remove them, let them cool for about 20 minutes while I start the rice, and then put on latex gloves and harvest whatever usable meat I can from them and toss that back in the pot. Is this piece too fatty? Well, I’ll just snack on it. Problem solved. The skin gets packed in paper towels to dry so it can be fried up in bacon grease later on. Here they are at harvest time:
I’m reporting out of sequence here. I could’ve just stopped at the first pic of the beans and rice. But I took some pics and has a story to tell. And I have some more pics, and a little bit more of a story to tell.
Adding the Tasso, ham hocks, bunches of thyme sprigs, and parsley:
This is my chicken stock of choice. I don’t care that it’s labeled as free range or organic. But it tastes better than Swanson or College Inn or Kitchen Basics or any of the others I e tried. It’s good just heated up and consumed on its own:
I’m at the point where I really don’t pay that much attention to the recipe. Two 32 oz cartons of that broth filled the pot to the right point where it won’t spill all over when it comes to a boil. More can always be added later on and I did throw in about a cup of leftover College Inn chicken stock after it reduced for awhile just to clear out some inventory.
Then after some simmering:
Then after more simmering:
I regret that I didn’t take another pic after the hocks were removed, the rice was started, the meat from the hocks was harvested, the beans removed from the pot, mashed (this time I just crushed them in a separate bowl with the same slotted spoon I used to remove them instead of using an immersion blender), and returned, along with the hock meat. That would’ve really tied it all together and showed the change in color from a yellowish stew made with chicken stock to the brownish dish that comes out as a result. But that’s why I posted the last part first.
I think a grade of B is fair.