New Orleans

Shrimp gumbo for Mardi Gras – okra, shrimp, filé

February 23, 2022 by Lisa Grable 21 Comments

Here is my shrimp gumbo recipe to add to our Mardi Gras festivities!

And here is another Mardi Gras favorite – shrimp gumbo, one of my favorite foods for Mardi Gras season. Gumbo is a famous type of stew or soup, made with any kind of seafood and sometimes chicken. Shrimp gumbo has a unique taste from the okra and filé. Filé is ground sassafras leaves! Shrimp and okra are plentiful in the summer too!

You will need a sharp knife, a large pot, big spoon, foil, and a baking pan for shrimp gumbo. (My pot is 8 quarts).

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cover the baking pan with foil, dull side up. Carefully spread the flour thinly over the baking pan.

Place on the middle rack of the oven to toast the flour. Stir occasionally. After 30 min. the flour should be a tan color.

Dice the bell peppers and banana peppers into half inch squares. Mince the garlic. Louisiana has its own version of mirepoix called Holy Trinity. It is a chopped mixture of onion, celery, and bell pepper. If you decide to go this route, I suggest taking it easy with the onion and perhaps only use 2 slices of onion so as to not make the taste too prevalent.

Cut the tops off the okra and discard. Slice the okra into ½ inch slices. (Note: this recipe works fine with frozen okra, which may be easier to find in the winter. And it gets soft faster!).

Heat the pan to medium (I put a generous pat of butter in the pan – when it melts I know it’s hot.) Add the olive oil and immediately add the toasted flour. Stir together to make a roux. Cook and stir until smooth and the color of an old penny. This should take about 5 minutes.

Add the peppers, okra, and garlic. Cook and stir until the peppers lose their crispness.

Add beer and chicken broth. Add bay leaf, Cajun/Creole seasoning, and Pickapeppa sauce.

Bring to a boil, lower the heat to simmer. Cover and cook for about an hour (longer if you want the okra to really fall apart).

Add shrimp and cook for 10 more minutes. Add the gumbo filé powder. Remove bay leaf.

Mound rice into a bowl and serve gumbo on top. Serves 6. Serve with French baguette and put some gumbo filé and hot sauce on the table! Tip: Serve with cauliflower rice if you want less carbs!

Tips: 1) Roux, okra, and filé are all thickening agents. You can get away with leaving either the okra or the filé out. 2) To defrost frozen cooked shrimp: Place shrimp in a bowl of cold tap water for 20 minutes. Pour into a colander and rinse. 3) This shrimp gumbo tastes fine with the addition of other seafoods (fish fillet, oysters, crabmeat), chicken, or even sausage. 4) You can make roux the traditional way by adding flour to oil in a hot pan. You will need to cook and stir for about 20 minutes.

Shrimp gumbo, a Louisiana classic soup served with rice. Shrimp, okra, and gumbo file provide flavor, and you can add more seafood and chicken - tasty!

Nutrition facts for shrimp gumbo

1 recipe is 2362 calories. Makes 6 servings at 394 cal. These nutrition numbers depend on ingredients used.

Resource links

http://www.realcajunrecipes.com/recipe/oven-made-roux/
- Oven made roux from Real Cajun Recipes
http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/09/history-new-orleans-gumbo-okra-file-powder.html
- Gumbo, okra, and file from Serious Eats
http://www.mardigrasneworleans.com/mgdates.html
- Mardi Gras dates from Mardi Gras New Orleans

Let’s talk story

The Three Kings arrive on January 6, the Twelfth Day of Christmas. That is the start of Mardi Gras season, which lasts until the day before Ash Wednesday, Fat Tuesday. Ash Wednesday is the beginning of the Lent fasting season, so traditionally people would use up all their fats on Tuesday by feasting. Mardi Gras season is a time for friends and family and good food.

Me and my Papa in New Orleans

Mardi Gras party menu

Hurricanes, Abita and Dixie beer, jambalaya, red beans and rice, muffuletta sliders, remoulade with baguettes, ham, and cheese, King cake. Download a free printable for your Mardi Gras table!

I’ll be looking for comments below, or contact me at lisa [at] casabouquet[dot]com.

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Muffuletta sliders

Hurricane cocktail

Red beans and rice

Here’s the 2017 year in review. I’m sharing some of the top posts for 2017. I am so grateful for my readers and the community of bloggers.

Hurricane cocktail was the top post of the year. The main ingredient is passion fruit juice! This is so versatile – you can make up a pitcher of the juices to serve a crowd. It’s delicious from the pitcher or with dark rum added!

Hurricane cocktail is a fruity passion fruit and rum drink. Invented in New Orleans, it's a great Mardi Gras libation!

Two servings

The plastic cup chicken sound experiment is a fun craft activity for kids, looks like a joke, and is a great way to learn about sound and how musical instruments work.

Rodan + Fields eyelash booster by Brianne Monroe was the top guest post this year. Brianne has a knack for explaining how beauty products work in real life. I want to thank my other guest posters too: Amy Overbay, Michelle Benigno, Suzy Barile and Katie Park Taylor.

I’ve been so blessed this year to find a group of wonderful women to dance hula with regularly. So it makes me happy that my top post on Hawaii for 2017 was on hula culture, art, and practice.

Hula is an ancient Hawaiian cultural practice. Today hula is often viewed as a dance art form by non-Hawaiians, but hula culture has many layers of cultural significance.

The Dalire sisters dance together at Merrie Monarch 2013.

Holiday in Mexico was part of my Latin flavor film festival. Xavier Cugat leads his band with the help of his tiny chihuahua and Jane Powell and Roddy McDowell have a fun mid-century teen romance.

The school spirit baby bib is one of my favorites. It was so fun to coordinate fabrics to make my little grandson look like he was wearing his grandfather’s game day shirt and tie.

Muffuletta sliders for Mardi Gras

February 24, 2020 by Lisa Grable 13 Comments

One of my favorite foods for Mardi Gras season is muffuletta sliders. A muffuletta is a famous New Orleans sandwich, a favorite of Sicilians in the early 20^th century. It’s a very large, filling sandwich, so I serve this muffuletta sliders version at Mardi Gras parties.

You will need foil, a baking pan, a bowl, and a sharp long knife for muffuletta sliders.

Place the contents of 2 Italian olive salad jars in a bowl. Add sliced kalamata olives and capers and mix well.

With a serrated bread knife or other long knife, cut party rolls in half lengthwise through the center. Put the top halves aside for now. Place the bottom half on a cutting board.

Carefully spoon the olive salad mix onto the bottom half of the rolls, trying not to scoop all the oil as you go. Spread the olive mix over all the bread thinly (it should look like one vegetable thick).

Cover the surface with Swiss cheese, then ham.

Spoon olive mix and cover the surface thinly. (This layer can be omitted if desired.)

Cover the surface with provolone, then Genoa salami.

Spoon olive mix and cover the surface thinly.

Put the top half of the rolls on top. With a very sharp knife, cut the rolls apart.

Carefully slide the rolls onto the shiny side of a large piece of foil. Wrap well (the oil will try to ooze out).

Place on a baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes, until the cheeses are melted. Serve with lots of paper napkins!

Muffuletta sliders are an irresistible combination of Italian olive salad, genoa salami, ham, Swiss, and provolone!

Nutrition facts for muffuletta sliders

One recipe of 24 muffuletta sliders is approximately 9950 calories. 1 slider is approximately 415 calories. Calorie count will depend on exact products you use.

Are you watching your carbs? I’ve had success making a healthier version by making a muffuletta quesadilla! My tortilla is made of spaghetti squash, liquid egg, and swiss cheese. I layer on low sodium turkey deli slices, low fat grated swiss cheese, and of course, the muffuletta olive salad mix. Delicious!