Jambalaya by Tom!

We're really lucky to have a guest chef on Our Family Kitchen - Aaron's pops, Tom! The other day I was in the mood for something from the South and knew that the only person I should ask for a recipe was Tom.

For my first foray into Southern cooking, Tom suggested that I make a jambalaya. His recipe makes for a lot, and at first I was a little puzzled by the steps that were unfamiliar to me (cooking the shrimp in the rice? stewing the sauce for an hour? The enormous amount of onions used?). Well I should have known to never doubt Tom's recipe! I made the dish exactly as prescribed and it was just perfect. Here it goes:

Jambalaya by Tom (with my notes)

Ingredients

3 large onion, chopped

2 bell peppers, chopped

1 cup of oil

1 8-ounce can of tomato sauce

1 6-ounce can of tomato paste

1/2 cup of chopped green onion tops

1/2 cup of chpped parsley

2 cloves of garlic, minced

6 cups of water

5 teaspoons of salt

black pepper and cayenne pepper to your taste (remember you want it to be a little tingly, but not burning hot)

2 bay leaves

4 cups of raw rice (I used Basmati rice)

2 pounds of peeled and deveined shrimp (use 2 lb if you are only using shrimp. For mine I use 1 lb shrimp, 1 lb chicken, 1.5 lb andouille sausage)

Steps:

1. Saute onions and bell pepper in oil over low heat until onions are transparent; add tomato sauce and tomato paste and cook on low heat for one hour.

(Meanwhile I marinated 1 lb chicken thigh pieces in lemon juice, salt, and pepper. I browned the chicken pieces. I also browned the andouille sausage and sliced them)

2. Add remaining ingredients, stir well and bring to a boil; pour into a greased baking dish, cover and bake at 300 degrees F for one hour or until rice is cooked

3. The final product should not be wet; more of the consistency of mashed potatoes, if you get my drift.

4. If you're into white whines, a good Italian Orvietto goes well, but you can also serve it with hearty red wines (a good petite syrah like Spellbound is a good compliment).

5. Serve with a nice green salad, balsamic vinegrette dressing

Fish Roe Fried Rice!

Ingredients:

2 cups of white rice

2 eggs

2 filets of tilapia

kosher salt

black pepper

white pepper

cornstarch

1 small box of sweet fish roe

olive oil

Steam rice in rice cooker or cook over stove. Heat a little bit of oil on the wok on high heat until hot. Put in rice and spread in thin layer. leave foor 3 minutes. flip the rice and leave for another 3 minutes. Take out rice and put in a big bowl.

Cut up tilapia into bite size pieces. In a bowl, mix cornstarch, kosher salt, white and black pepper together. Coat tilapia with this mixture. Put in a good bit of oil in the wok and heat on medium high heat. Drop the tilapia pieces into the wok. Pan fry until golden brown. Take out and drain onto some paper towels.

Scramble two eggs and half the fish roe in a bowl. Heat up wok with a bit more oil. Put the egg mixture in. When the bottom of the egg hardens a little bit, put in the rice. Stir it all up! Add a bit more salt. Now put the fish back in and stir it all up for 5 minutes.

Put the entire fried rice back into the big bowl and make a small well in the middle. Put the remaining roe into the wok and fry until cooked. Put all roe into the well.

Easy peasy!