Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

February in Chicago is not a time for getting crazy.  Going crazy, however, is fairly common.   But, it is the week of Mardi Gras and the opportunity to observe a seasonal celebratory intervention is far too appealing to pass up, even if it isn't exactly regional.  We may be stretching it with a Fat Thursday, but no matter the day, the Big Easy cooks up some darn good food, and a cauldron spicy goodness is just what Dr. Oz ordered to beat the winter doldrums. 

With that in mind, we revved up the recipe search engines.... but then they sputtered... and then they idled.  As it turns out, every church group, school lunch program and ladies guild has a recipe for gumbo and don't even try to count the blogs!  Jambalaya renditions call for everything from pork butt to smoked turkey legs to kielbasa.  How is a Yankee cook to decide? Thank goodness for Wikipedia!    As it turns out, there may not actually be one right way to skin this cat. And unlike the Italian government, Louisiana has not yet commissioned a food police that travels the globe seeking out culinary impostors.  So we tried not to over-google it and loosely followed a recipe from Paul Prudhomme that maximized our potential for success and minimized our margin for error while promising a stew that could be ready in just about an hour.

As with most of our more involved stews, this recipe calls for a full roster of prep chefs to chop, dice and mince the fresh vegetables.  It's also a full time job for one cook to pull the chicken meat.  We use chicken Andouille sausage for just about everything, including this gumbo, but feel free to use a more authentic raw pork Andouille. Just factor in the time to grill or roast the raw sausages before adding them to the soup pot.  We loved the flavor we got from Whole Food's smokehouse chickens (look for the weekly sale) but a traditional rotisserie bird will work just fine.  We subbed crushed tomatoes for some of the stock and added roasted red peppers because a Cajun chef we once met did the same and it was really tasty.  And finally... gulp... we skipped the roux.  We can't advocate for this option, as we know the roux is the heart and soul of any gumbo, but we can offer up that it was our first time making gumbo for a crowd and we were a little nervous.  We thickened with okra instead. That said, next time... it's a roux all the way. 


Chicken and Sausage Gumbo
40 servings

• 1/2 cup + 1/2 cup olive oil, divided
• 8 cups finely chopped onions
• 8 cups finely chopped green peppers
• 6 cups finely chopped celery 
• 3 TBS garlic, minced 
• 4 TBS Creole seasoning (we love King Creole from the Spice House on Wells)
• 2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 8 tsp freshly ground pepper
• 1 x 106oz can Italian plum tomatoes, crushed by hand with juice
• 6 qts chicken stock (we buy the 6-pack of Pacific Foods brand at Costco)
• 8 bay leaves
• 4 rotisserie chickens, white and dark meat pulled from the bone
• 4 lbs pre-cooked chicken andouille sausage, sliced  (we used Amy's brand at Costco)
• 5 lbs frozen cut okra, rinsed and drained in an XL colander
• 16 oz jarred roasted red peppers, finely minced
• 1 TBS sea salt or more to taste
• 2 TBS file powder (also available at the Spice House or at well-stocked grocers)

Preheat the flattop grill to medium-high heat. 

Place the largest stockpot in the kitchen over med-high heat and add the chicken stock, crushed tomatoes and bay leaf.

When the grill top is warm,  add half the olive oil and heat until shimmering but not so long that the oil begins to smoke.  Add the onion, green pepper and celery and saute until lightly caramelized.  Add the garlic, spices and cayenne and saute 1-2 minutes more until fragrant. Transfer the vegetables to the stock pot.

Add the remaining oil to the grill top and saute the sausage rounds until lightly seared.  Transfer sausages to the stock pot. 

While the vegetables and sausages are being sauteed,  rinse the okra in a colander with cool water until water runs clear.  This will remove some of the viscosity (slime) from the okra.  Allow the okra to rest in the colander, shaking occasionally to drain off any excess water.

About ten minutes before serving, add the okra, roasted red peppers and file powder to the gumbo pot.   Check for flavor and season with salt and pepper as needed.   

Serve gumbo hot over a scoop of rice (recipe below) and with plenty of hot sauce on the side. Enjoy! 

Rice for a Crowd
40 servings

• 7 cups long grain brown rice
• 14 cups spring water
• 8 cubes vegetable bouillon (we like Rapunzel brand Sea Salt and Herb)
  

Pour the water into a medium stock pot and put over high heat.   Add the bouillon cubes and cover the pot with a lid.

Rinse dry rice under one or two changes of cool water to remove dust and grit.  Transfer rice to the stock pot with the warming water.  Bring pot to a boil, give the contents a good stir to break up any chunks of bouillon, and lower heat to medium.  

Allow rice to cook at a gentle simmer, covered, until all water has been absorbed and rice is tender.  Take pot off heat and keep in a warm place until ready to serve. 

Chilaquiles with Chorizo Sausage

Chilaquiles is comfort food if there ever was such a thing.  It's a hearty meal that's pantry friendly and perfect for a morning when you're light on cooks but heavy on appetite (and that means anytime you're serving a meal for 30+ men).   The dish below loosely morphs a Rick Bayless recipe with the tasty breakfast rendition served at Flo Restaurant  in West Town.  The result is a soupy, spicy heap of thick tortilla chips loaded with scrambled eggs and chorizo sausage.  No one leaves hungry.

Some cook's tips...  it's critical to use thick and hearty, authentic Mexican tortilla chips (try El Milagros or El Ranchero) as they'll retain their shape and texture when doused with sauce.  A lesser chip will immediately regress to corn flour and leave you with... well, not breakfast.  We have a soft spot for the made-in-Chicago Frontera products, but if you can find a delicious enchilada sauce elsewhere or prefer to make your own, feel free to substitute. (That said, we've done the taste test, and the dish is truly better with the sauce called for below.)  If you do choose Frontera, six jars of the enchilada sauce qualifies for a 10% case discount at Whole Foods which means you'll get your sixth jar free.  You can also special order 3 lbs of loose chorizo from the Whole Foods meat counter and have it made in just a few hours. Be sure to request their occasional  "3lb bulk sausage discount" if it's available that day.  Also consider ordering turkey rather than pork sausage.  You'll get a lighter, but no less tastier, dish that's just right for breakfast.

Finally, chilaquiles falls somewhere in the casserole category and, as such, is not the most sophisticated looking breakfast dish you'll encounter.  It's a home style meal that's more army grub than brunch crowd, so be prepared for a skeptical glance or two at the buffet line.  Then, be prepared for requests for seconds.  Enjoy! 

Chilaquiles with Chorizo Sausage

Serves 36

• 6 jars (96 oz) Frontera Red Chile Enchilada cooking sauce (or any good-quality or homemade enchilada sauce)
• 3 quarts chicken stock
• 48 oz authentic Mexican, thick-cut tortilla chips (Frontera, El Milagros, El Ranchero)*
• 3 cups grated cheese (Queso Anejo, Parmesan or Romano)
• 1/2 cup olive oil, divided
• 6 small or 4 medium white onions, diced
• 36 eggs, free-range wherever possible
• 3 lb loose pork or turkey chorizo sausage (we special order this from Whole Foods)
• 1 tub sour cream
• 2 bunches cilantro, trimmed and finely chopped 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Preheat flattop grill to medium-high heat. 

Warm the chicken stock in a sauce pan over medium heat.  Warm the enchilada sauce in a separate sauce pan over medium heat.

Heat 1/4 cup olive oil on the grill top until just shimmering, being careful not to burn.  Saute the onions until translucent and lightly browned.  Add chorizo to the grill top and saute until lightly browned, breaking up into small pieces as you go.  Transfer the sausage mixture to a pre-heated, full-size, extra deep hotel pan and tightly cover.  Set pan aside

Scramble the eggs in a large mixing bowl and season with salt and pepper.  Warm the remaining 1/4 cup olive oil in an extra large saute pan and add eggs to the pan.  Gently scramble until just cooked through, stirring as little as possible to allow large curds to form. 

Transfer eggs to the hotel pan with the sausage mixture.  Add the warm enchilada sauce to the pan and stir gently to combine.  Add the tortilla chips, grated cheese and half the chopped cilantro and gently fold all ingredients together until chips are generously coated, adding chicken stock in small amounts as needed to stretch the sauce.  

Serve chilaquiles immediately, as they become soggy if left to sit. Garnish with the remaining chopped cilantro and sour cream and serve with chilled mango nectar, as orange juice can be too acidic for this dish.

Sausages with Sweet Potato Hash

MMMM....hash!  Served with eggs, it makes a classic, down-home breakfast.  Served with a main course and a salad as described here,  it makes a great dinner dish.  The oven-roasted method described below eliminates the need for a cook at the flattop grill, but if you have the cook-power and love traditional hash, feel free to fry it up.  We use roasted red peppers as a stand-in for fresh when bell peppers are out of season.  Huge jars can occasionally be found at Costco, and when we find them, we buy extras for the pantry.  If they're not stocked there, the next place to look is at a Greek or Italian grocery.  The jars will be huge and the price will be right.  Beyond that, you'll find them next to other jarred and pickled vegetables at well-stocked groceries.  As always, we hit Stanley's for the remainder of our vegetables.

There's a plethora of all-natural, pre-cooked chicken sausages on the market today, the best-known of which may be Amy's brand, available at most grocery stores.  Several flavors of Amy's are available at Costco, including a sweet Apple-Gouda and a mildly spicy Andouille.  We use both flavors with good results.  Trader Joe's sells similar sausages under their store-brand which are equally delicious.  Oven roasting the sausages yields a crisp outside and a tender center and takes just a few minutes to prepare.  We serve them Chicago-style: on a bun with mustard and hot peppers as desired; hold the ketchup!

To compliment the sweet flavors in this meal and to combat the cold weather outside, we start things off with mugs of hot cider long before dinner is ready.  This takes the edge off the cold and makes the dining room smell great.  A simple platter of crudites and vegetable dip makes a nice starter.  Still or sparkling water is good with the dinner itself.  Enjoy!  

WARM SPICED CIDER

Gently heat prepared spiced apple cider (available at Trader Joe's and other groceries)  in an XL stock pot over medium heat, adding a fresh cinnamon stick or two as desired.  Ladle cider into warm mugs to serve.

OVEN-ROASTED SAUSAGES
Makes 42 sausages

• (1) 21-count package of Amy's Apple Gouda chicken sausage (available at Costco)
• (1) 21-count package of Amy's Andouille chicken sausage (available at Costco)
• 1/4 cup olive oil plus 2 TBS olive oil
• 5 medium yellow onions
  
• 42 sausage buns, whole wheat if possible
• 16 oz jarred hot peppers or Giardinara
• 5 medium yellow onions
• Dijon mustard

Preheat convection oven to 400 degrees.  Preheat grill top to medium-high heat. 


Slice onions into thin rings.  When grill top is hot, warm 1/4 olive oil until just shimmering.  Saute onions for 20-30 minutes until deeply golden and caramelized.  Keep warm until ready to serve.

 

Use a basting brush to lightly oil two sheet pans with olive oil.  Arrange sausages in a single layer on each pan, using one pan for each type of sausage you'll be serving.  Roast sausages until they have deeply browned and rendered some of their juices, approximately 20 minutes in a commercial oven.  They will shrink in size but greatly increase in flavor when cooked until well done.  

While sausages are roasting, arrange sausage buns on an additional sheet pan.  Transfer pan to the oven about five minutes before serving to lightly toast the buns.  

To serve, place a sausage in each bun and offer caramelized onions, hot peppers and mustard on the side.

 

SWEET POTATO, MUSHROOM AND RED PEPPER HASH
Serves 36

• 5 lbs fresh button or crimini mushrooms, stalks trimmed and tops quartered
• 5 lbs sweet potatoes, scrubbed and cubed into small dice
• 5 large Spanish or sweet yellow onions, diced
• 36 oz jarred roasted red peppers, diced
• 3/4 cup olive oil
• generous amounts of sea salt and pepper
• 1 bunch flat-leaf parsley, washed, trimmed and finely chopped for garnish

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

 

Prepare the mushrooms, potatoes, onions and peppers as described and combine them all in a full-size hotel pan.  Toss the vegetables with the olive oil and generously season with salt and pepper.  Transfer the pan to the oven and roast for 30-40 minutes, stirring occasionally, until everything is tender and lightly caramelized.  Cooking time may vary depending upon your oven.  The time given above is for a commercial convection oven.   If using a conventional oven, allow an additional 20+ minutes to cook. 

WINTER FRUIT SALAD WITH HONEY-YOGURT DRESSING
Serves 40

• 5 lbs assorted apples
• 5 lbs assorted pears
• 4 lbs grapes
• 6 lemons, freshly juiced
• 2 cups raisins
• 1 qt 2% Greek yogurt 
• 1/2 cup honey 
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

In a small bowl, squeeze the juice from the lemons and remove the seeds with a spoon.  Add the raisins to the lemon juice to rehydrate. 

Prepare the dressing so it's ready to use as soon as the fruit is chopped.  This will keep the fruit from browning.  In a bowl, combine yogurt, honey, cinnamon and vanilla and mix well.  Test for flavor and add more honey as desired.

  

Wash and core apples and pears and chop into bite sized pieces.  Wash and drain grapes.  Combine both in a large serving bowl.   Add the dressings, lemon juice and raisins to the fruit bowl and mix well.  Chill until ready to serve.

Thoughts for Food: Sausage

Sausage makes a regular appearance on our menus, particularly this time of year when hearty and filling comfort food is in order.  We still lean toward meals where veggies can play a strong supporting, if not starring role, but we find that sausage gives winter meals that little something-something needed to beat the chill and satisfy the appetite. Sausage is extremely versatile in the kitchen, quick to cook and widely varying in flavor.  It's as simple to slice and add to a dish as it is to serve on its own.  It's fantastic in hearty soups, especially when paired with potato, delectable in rustic dishes like polenta and always delicious in a bun with sauteed onions and mustard... a phenomenon known as Chicago-style... don't even think about ketchup.  It's also a huge hit on the breakfast table when paired with something sweet like pancakes or bread pudding or something homey like grits.  All that said, and even with the limitless breadth of sausage possibilities available, we do consistently return to a few tried and true favorites which we've described below.

For dishes that call for a loose sausage (i.e. sausage that has not been stuffed into a casing), we consistently order about 3lbs of the turkey variety from the butcher (or in our case, the Whole Foods meat counter).  We find that 3 lbs of loose sausage is almost always adequate for serving 30-40 people, at least in the recipes you'll find posted here.  If you like things meatier, feel free to order more, but 3lbs is probably as low as you want to go.  We find that using turkey rather than pork sausage gives us all the flavor but much less saturated fat.  For spicy or south-of-the border recipes, we order turkey chorizo.  For Southern recipes where we mix sausage and grits, we order turkey breakfast sausage.   For topping a pizza, or for a spicy pasta sauce, we order loose turkey Italian.  Almost any sausage you can think of can be made using ground turkey (or even ground chicken) rather than ground pig and your heart will thank you.  3lbs of custom-order, loose turkey sausage (hormone-free and naturally-raised when purchased at Whole Foods) typically comes in around $18 dollars-- not bad when you consider that's enough meat for an entire meal for 40.

For dishes that call for a cased sausage, we still stick to poultry varieties.  On rare occasion, we're able to shop a sale at the Whole Foods meat counter, usually when the price begins to dip below $3-4/ lb.  Most often, we pick up the Trader Joe's store brand or buy bulk packages of Amy's brand at Costco.  For breakfast sausage, we love Amy's Apple and Gouda Chicken sausages.  (Our diners love them, too-- we simply can't serve enough at the men's shelter.)  For spicy soups like gumbo, andouille or cajun sausages are delicious.  For slicing and mixing into pasta bakes, spinach-feta or sundried tomato-basil are always a hit.  For serving on a bun as a traditional sandwich, we find that serving two or three varieties works best, as guest appreciate the option to choose their favorite.