How to make Shrimp Etouffee - Around the Kitchen Table

Hi everyone, I'm Chef Dennis Littley and welcome to Around the Kitchen Table. Susan will be joining us momentarily. We had a little technical difficulty before starting. My computer decided to restart itself about 3 minutes before the show, which is always fun. And then Susan was also having a little problem on her end, so she's going to change computers and she'll be joining us in just a few minutes. So thank you for joining us today, and it's a beautiful sunny day in Orlando, although it is a little bit chilly by Orlando terms. It's around 60 degrees today, which is still much better than they're having up north, so I'll take it. Today we're going to make something for Mardi Gras. Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday, is next Tuesday. Easter is really early this year, and Fat Tuesday comes next week. So in order to be prepared for that, I thought I would share one of my entrees. And you know, this could double as something something nice for Valentine's Day too if you're thinking of making something for that special someone in your life. Shrimp Étouffée is always a crowd pleaser whether it's for Mardi Gras or Valentine's Day or just for a nice dinner at home. Crack open a bottle of wine or some sparkling water and you've got yourself a party, NOLA style. So we're going to get started and Susan will join us in process.. And it's pretty simple to make. I've got my ingredients all out, and actually, you know, it's gonna simmer for a while. So that's the only time we won't be on. There she is. Hey, Susan.

Hi, finally, here we are. Hi, everybody.

Great. I just actually started a minute ago, and I told them you'd be joining us, and your picture looks great there.

Good, good. I am so excited about this show. You know, when I think of Mardi Gras, I think about all the bad things that you want to cram in into a few days or a week before you have to lay down and sacrifice and be good. And then when I think of that, I think of New Orleans.

Absolutely. Or as we say, N'awlins. Down here. And you know, actually, I— although I grew up in my younger days in Texas, and I always consider myself a Texan, I was born in Louisiana.

Oh, you were?

I was born at an Army base called Fort Polk. It was only Camp Polk then, but now it's grown to size and now it's an actual fort. But my father was— that was his last place he was stationed before he got out of the Army, and I was born there. And Then actually about 6 months into it, whisked away to Texas because I couldn't breathe the air down there. I was developing like an asthma from the dampness, and my mother had always said because they bury their garbage and, you know, just everything combined. So I don't know, but I mean, I—

so you're a native, let's call you a native.

Yeah, I'm a Southerner pretty much, although I, you know, I do consider myself a Texan. I was born in Louisiana, although bred in Texas, so I'll go both ways on this. All I know is that one thing about N'awlins is when you're down there and someone feeds you something, don't ask what it is, you just eat it.

Okay, I'm glad I knew that. Well, let me tell you, it took me decades and decades before I stopped saying New Orleans. So for me to say, how do I say it now, New Orleans, New Orleans, New Orleans. Instead of New Orleans, I mean I'm halfway there, right?

That's pretty good for a northerner, so we'll go with that. That's alright, it took me a while to learn to say Baltimore.

Now that I never heard.

Baltimore, gotta go Baltimore, gotta go all the way around Baltimore.

That's a good one. So look what you have in front of you, you have color, you have texture, I really can't wait to— let's get started and I'm going to see, now I had a beautiful slideshow to put together on my other computer, but you know what, I'm sure I can dig up a few, so I'm going to have one ear on you and one eye on some pictures.

Sounds good. You know, and the one thing about New Orleans cooking, and a lot of it is you hear is about roux, and you know, the roux is the basis for a lot of things that they make down there. And roux is pretty simple to make in different variations. Today we're going to make a roux that is going to be a little bit darker than I would normally like to make. I've got my butter in here, and I've already melted it a little bit and started it browning a little bit because I want to let my butter just get a little bit of color to it because that's going to help make the roux darker. And for étouffée, you want to have a little darkness to it, a little caramel coloring. Some people say it looks a little bit— you want to, when you put the flour in, you want it to get a little bit like peanut butter, that kind of a color. That would be a darker roux. Most times when we make a roux, we're making a lighter roux because we don't want to add color into it. I've got my butter heated in here. I melted it a little ahead because I let it cook. The one thing, there's a fine line between burnt butter and brown butter. We don't want burnt butter, we just want brown butter.

Brown butter is in so many wonderful dishes. It's such a unique taste.

It adds so much flavor. Now, there's a real— you have to move once it starts to brown. And start sprinkling your flour in because again, there's a fine line. I'm going to crank this down so I don't get too much heat from this. We're going to put our flour in. I add it in a little at a time.

I mean, would you say that that is pretty much the most important step? Because if you screw that up, it has to have a particular consistency and a particular flavor. Bad things will happen if you don't get that right, right?

That is an important part of their cooking. In fact, I have friends over in Tampa that opened up a New Orleans-style restaurant and it's called Roux.

Good name.

That's basically because so much comes from roux. You start with a roux. I'm scraping because I want to get all that color off the bottom. Starting to darken a little bit. Can't really tell as well on the camera. I'm starting to get some color. And generally you add in equal amounts of butter and flour whenever you make a roux. So I had about 4 tablespoons of butter and about 4 tablespoons of flour. Now you can make this, and you will hear some people tell you to make it with oil. Not butter.

I was wondering about that. Go ahead.

You can make it with oil. It will come out. It's not quite as French then if we're making it, but it's still going to come out fine. The reason people use oil is because oil has a higher heat temperature and it won't burn the way butter will burn. So you can control it a little bit better. Being a chef all these years, I like to make my roux with butter. If I'm making for someone who can't have dairy, that's a whole different story. Then I'll make it with oil, and it'll be fine. Talking about oils, too, we get so much soy shoved down our diets and things we don't even think about. When you buy oil, look for canola. Olive oil, something a little more natural. Now, I wouldn't use olive oil to make the roux, but I would use canola oil. Stay away from soy products. Like I said, they're in so many different things.

I'm coming in and out a little bit, just so you know. Okay. What about another flavored oil? What about peanut oil or sesame oil?

I think that would add kind of the wrong flavor to it. I would be wary of anything that has too heavily of a flavor oil. You could use it, but you want the oil to be a little neutral if it's not going to be used to add flavor in. In this case, we're not really using it. That's why I'll stay away from olive oil. I don't want that heavy olive flavor in it, that olive oil flavor. I want it to be neutral because I want the rest of the flavors of the dish to pick up. So that's going to start to smell. Smell a little bit like bread cooking, and then it should start to almost smell a little bit more caramelly to you as it browns.

So it shouldn't have a floury sort of smell at all?

No, you want to cook the flour, and that's something some people when they add flours into sauces or into gravies, they're not letting the flour cook and it's actually raw. So you want to cook the flour. You just want to be careful with it. In this case, I don't have to be quite as careful because it can brown. I just don't want it to burn because nothing burned is really good. At this point, I'm going to start adding in some of my veggies. I'm going to put my onions in because I want them to get a little cooked.. And because I wanted the roux to really darken, I let it cook a little before I did my veggies. Lots of times I will put the veggies in first and build my roux on top of it. And more onions than either of the other two in a roux. And this is the holy trinity for Louisiana-style cooking. It's not carrots. Onions and celery. It's peppers, onions, and celery.

Yeah, that is a classic term. It's funny, I was just trying to remember what is the term, and I don't know, I came up with trifecta, but I knew it was something like— I knew it was something like that. And that's the base of so many dishes, right?

Right. Well, when they call it— when they talk about it, they always refer to it as the Holy Trinity. For whatever reason. It seems like New Orleans cooking. That's what they call this, and, you know, instead of the carrot, leaving out the carrots and replacing it with peppers.

Okay, but I do have a question because celery and peppers will take longer to be tender than onions. How long do you cook this for? Do they all have to be tender before you go to the next step?

No, we just want to sweat them down a little bit. You want to get some heat into them. You want to let them cook and let them soften just a little bit because sautéing is really what you need to do when you cook vegetables, especially for soups, stews, anything like this. You want to let it cook before you add a little bit. It doesn't have to cook a lot, but you want to let it cook a little bit. I'm going to add a little bit more oil into this because it's just a little tight.

Okay, you know, because that always gives me a lot of anxiety. You know, recipes that say, okay, add carrots, celery, and onions, and then I worry about the carrots. This is actually a really important point, I think.

Again, you're just sweating them down. Lots of people will season with salt and pepper at this point also. I like to hold off a little bit until it's almost done so I can make sure I've got the seasoning right. In this case, we're going to be using a Cajun seasoning, so that may have a little salt into it too. So I won't finish seasoning it until it's almost done. Plus we have a little bit of salt from the stock that I used. And while this is cooking too, let me talk a little bit about the stock that I made. I used a regular chicken stock for this, but what I did was as I cut up these onions and celery— not the pepper so much, but the onions and celery— I saved the refuse from the onions and celery, the pieces that I didn't use, and I put them in a pot with the shrimp shells, and I put a little oil in it, and I cooked them a little bit. To get— again, to sweat them down before I put any liquid in it. And then I put some water in it, or some chicken stock in it, and let it simmer for about an hour. And it won't have an intense shrimp flavor, but you will pick up some shrimp flavor. And I can smell the shrimp in it, so you'll get something from it rather than just using a chicken stock or veggie— and you can do the same thing with a vegetable stock if you don't want to use chicken. Some people use clam juice, but I'm not real fond of that.

That's a good tip.

For me, clam juice seems to add this softness to the flavor that I'm just— even in my clam chatters, I rarely use unless it's from cooked clams. I don't add any more into it. This is heating up a little bit. Again, you're not trying to get them completely done completely soft. You just want to cook them a little bit so when you add the liquid in, you're not boiling vegetables.

You know what I think might be— I don't have the slideshow here today. I will create a link to images, which will be great. But you know what I'm thinking? As you're sweating over that stove, I think what you need to set the scene is some wonderful music. Absolutely. If this is Mardi Gras, I mean, get in the spirit, you know, have your favorite beverage, have the music, you know, blasting or not blasting, or, but have it, you know, really jog your spirit and get in the spirit of, you know, the Mardi Gras.

For sure. You know, music is important, and when I was cooking in some restaurants, I've always had music playing. Pretty much in every one I've worked at.

Really?

Yeah, it gives me something to concentrate on. Not real loud, but loud enough for me so I can just keep my rhythm going. When I was cooking 200-300 dinners a night, I needed to keep a rhythm going. That's what kept me going. We've got all that in. Now I'm going to add in the garlic and I'm going to add in some fresh chopped thyme.

Oh yes, the herbs are— the complexity of the herbs, they add a whole other layer.

Oh, absolutely.

A whole other layer.

I may have tightened up that roux just a little bit too much for this, but it's okay. We can always add a little bit more fat to it. Turn this down a little bit because it's starting to brown, which is good. You should smell this now. Peppers, the onions, very aromatic. Now we just want to toss them around a bit. We wanted to get a little bit of heat on that garlic. I'm not looking to brown it. I'm not looking to fully cook it. Again, I don't want it to be raw.

Part of it, too, part of the whole experience is to is to have fun and to bring in, you know, your different placemats and colors and bring in sort of a cacophony of all sorts of stimulating, you know, textures and textures in the form of— they could be plants, they could be paintings, they could be fabrics draped over chairs. They could be, you know, you could really make it a visually stimulating experience.

Well, that's what you want to think about. It's like you say, you want to, you know, eat with your eyes. Well, you want to give your eyes something more to look at too. So here we're going to put in a can of diced tomatoes.

That's applause. Is that applause I'm hearing? Applause? Applause?

It sounds just like applause. That was the pan applauding for the tomatoes as it hit it. Then we're going to hit it with a little bit of the Cajun seasoning. You can make your own. You can buy something store-bought. Just put it in a little at a time. You don't have to have it all in. You can always add a little bit more if it's too hot for you, if it's too spicy for you. All right, so that is that. And then this is just gonna simmer. I'm gonna turn it down and just let it simmer for a little bit and get some heat under it, pull together. See how the tomatoes pull the flour together a little bit?

Yeah, so they all have to now talk to each other and— Yeah, get to know each other. And yeah, and you know, I also like the idea If you're going to do a let it all hang out with a Mardi Gras kind of feeling, even change things up. Bring in some mix-matched chairs, for example, around the table. Just do something that you don't normally do. So go around different rooms and set a table with mix-matched chairs. Here on my table, I have them in my dining room. I don't know if you can see, I actually have a rug on my dining room table. I mean, this is a new— this is actually a new rug, but it's one, it's very thin and it's hand woven. And the point is, it's an alternative. Do things that are different, an alternative to how you usually live in the kitchen or live in the dining room. Then it will be a whole different experience. It's always fun.

It's fun to be a little eclectic, or colorful, as I like to describe it. Here I'm going to start putting in my stock. You can do the stock before the tomatoes if you're not sure. This kind of gives me more of a bearing of how much liquid I'm going to have in it. I can always add more stock. Now we're getting to be that nice color. Etouffée can be brown, it can be a little bright. I like mine to be a little bright. It's actually going to darken up a little as it cooks because this has really got to cook for about another 45 minutes. It's got to simmer. This is something you can make early in the day, too. If you want to make this let it cool down and let it sit all afternoon or overnight and come back and finish it. You know, the next day you can do that too.

You know, I was also going to ask you, is that something you can make and freeze?

Oh, sure.

If you make a lot of it, you could probably—

you know, I have not frozen this. This should all freeze real well. But if you make this base like this, you more likely could freeze it, save it, and bring it out and just make a quick— like if you made a greater volume of etouffée and you want to do— because basically it's chicken, it's shrimp, crayfish are the big one, lobster, anything you really want to put into it. It's still an etouffée. It's not a gumbo because you don't have the okra in it. You don't have the sausage in it, so we're not calling it that., but it's, you know, this is an egg tofu. It's just a very thickened, simple—

It looks absolutely amazing, and it looks like the flavors are just, you know, all going to blend together. And I would guess the longer you, or the earlier you make it, the better it will be over time?

Yeah, the flavor's really going to build. You want to give it a few hours for the flavors to really build. Tomorrow, if you tasted this, it will have a lot more pop to it, a lot more flavor to it. It's still going to be very good right now, but actually, as you give it some time, everything starts to bloom.

Hey, Chef, I got a couple of other ideas for a spiritual amazing Mardi Gras, and I'm right here in my dining room, and I'll show you. I mean, these are temporary things that you can do that are You know what, all of that's fun. So I'm going to turn the computer here and I'm going to show you what I have on this—

I think we just lost you there, Susan. Oh, wait a minute, I hear you.

Okay, can you hear me? Can you see me?

We're looking at your pink dress.

You're looking at a dress, it's an orange dress and it's hanging up in my living room and it has gold trim and you know what, I have seen New Orleans homes with a rack of shoes, a string of shoes, of cool shoes, things like that that add spirit. Over here is a garden bench that I have in my— yeah, down here that I have in my dining room. So I love the idea of bringing things, decorative items from the outdoors into the kitchen. I love that.

Very cool. And you know, and again, bringing out your personality, bringing out your— just something from you that talks about you. And you know, and New Orleans is real big on that. People down there just, you know, like you said, it could be a rack of shoes, it could be a rack of anything. That speaks to them. That's a great thing. This is basically your sauce, your base for your etouffée. You're going to taste it. You're going to season it as you need more salt, pepper, a little more Cajun seasoning. If you want a little heat into it, put a little of your favorite hot sauce in it.

Absolutely.

Okay, a little Worcestershire if you like. This is just a base. Like I said, I'll see recipes for this so many different ways.. When I made my stock, like I said, it was the shells, chicken stock, and you can use canned. I threw a few lemon slices in there and just let it simmer. So this is going to have a little bit more depth of flavor to it because of that. Now I'm going to show you what to do that's just a little bit more fun. This is going to go to the side for a minute. I'm not going to cook them all because it's kind of early for dinner and Lisa is still at school.. But I'm going to show you what I'm going to do with the shrimp. This is going to be a shrimp etouffée. How I'm going to serve it is I'm going to make some nice white rice, kind of bland, kind of plain. I'm going to serve the rice in the center of the bowl. I'm going to have the etouffée around it. Then I'm going to take these shrimp. The one thing you have to be careful of when you're using seafood is overcooking it. If I put that shrimp in there and I left it in there, it's going to get tough, it's going to get rubbery, and it's expensive, and you're wasting it. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to sauté these shrimp. I forgot to turn it back up. Just a little bit, and I'm only going to do a few to give you an idea, of olive oil. Very little. If you have a cast iron pan, That would be good, too. Then I'm going to, as it gets hot, you can hear it start to sizzle, I'm just going to add in a little bit of this Cajun seasoning. Press it into it. You can even do this ahead of time, rub them with it, get some color.

I love shrimp that way. I love when it has some flavors sort of cooked into it like that.

And I'm not going to be afraid of the pan burning, okay? Because I want to cook these really fast, and I want to get some real color into them, and I want that seasoning to burn a little bit.

And you know, I'll tell you, Chef, I have never in my life had shrimp, the flavors of shrimp that I've had when I've been down south, particularly to New Orleans. Completely different flavor than up here. It's just so wonderful.

All right, I don't know how well you can tell.

Oh, those look great. Those are big.

Beautiful. So see, they're not quite done because I don't want to get them all the way cooked. But you can see how, like I said, if you get this pan really, really hot and you let that seasoning even burn and blacken a little bit. Don't overcook the shrimp. Don't be afraid to let that seasoning get dark and crusty and the shrimp are going to look really, really good. So when you go to serve your etouffée, buffet, then you can place these cooked shrimp on top and really, it will really look nice. It will look special. It will look very festive. Then to finish it all off, I'm going to put a little— I'll take pictures of it later for you when it's finished.

Those shrimp look amazing. Those look like super jumbo shrimp.

Those are under 15s.

Wow.

When I go to buy shrimp, I usually buy 16-20s and they're Gulf shrimp.. They did not have 16/20s, they had U15s. It's because the 16/20s had a really good sale on them, so they were all bought out. I buy a 5-pound bag of them, but they're just really tasty, sweet. The Gulf shrimp are just fantastic. We season it up, and then when I go to serve it, as I've served my bowl out, I've got the rice set, I've got the étouffée around it, I'm going to sprinkle it with some chopped green onions. Some chopped parsley just to make it look pretty and add a little bit more color because remember, we eat with our eyes. Flavors come out when they're colorful and pretty. Okay, I think I lost you again, Susan, or you lost me.

Anyway— Yeah, I'm back now. I was frozen for a while.

Okay, so that's about it, and that's our art fair, for Mardi Gras, for Fat Tuesday, or just to make any day a special day. It doesn't have to be an occasion. Make a day an occasion by making something nice to eat. Really, the whole base of the étouffée is not that expensive. It's just those shrimp. If you buy 3/4 pound of shrimp, and it costs you about $8 or $10, and you can make a really nice meal for under $20 total with probably a bottle of wine thrown in too. You know, it'd be a good night.

Oh yeah, and get that string and hang up those stilettos.

Oh yeah.

Have yourself a good time.

Yeah, you won't be the only one having a good time. Whoever's on the other end of those stilettos will be having a good time.

That's right, that's right. There you go. Beautiful. Thank you so much, Chef. I'm going to make that one. You made it easy for the home cook.

I'm telling you, it is simple. You almost take more time. You got to watch it and watch it cook a while, but cutting up your vegetables is generally the most time-consuming part of the whole dish.

Yeah, well, you made it look easy.

All right, well, thank you all for coming around the kitchen table with us today. I hope you enjoy the etouffée. And Susan, thank you for braving the technical difficulties because, you know, this is what happens on live TV. You never know. We don't have those producers to help us.

That's right. And come back for my link. I promise good pictures and stimulating and fun.

Very good.

A lot of fun stuff.

I'll have this post ready with the pictures and the recipes for you tomorrow, too. We'll see you soon.

Bye-bye.