Shrimp Etouffee

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

This is another one of the recipes that I made on my family's 2010 Fourth of July trip to Port O'Connor, and it was a hit! I was especially happy that my Dad was impressed, because he was born in New Orleans and loves cajun food. Also, this recipe is adapted from Emeril's version (and uses his "Essence"), so you really can't go wrong.

WARNING - there are a lot of ingredients and quite a bit of prep time involved, but it is worth it.

Ingredients:

• 1 stick unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup flour
• 2 cups chopped yellow onions
• 1 cup chopped celery
• 1/2 cup chopped green bell peppers
• 1/2 cup chopped red bell peppers
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 3 teaspoons minced garlic
• 2 cups water
• 2 1/2 teaspoons Essence  (you can buy it ready-made at most grocery stores or make it using the recipe below)
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 cup seeded and chopped tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons dry white wine
• 2 tablespoons fresh chopped parsley
• 2 teaspoons fresh chopped thyme
• 1 1/2 - 2 pounds shrimp, peeled
• 3 tablespoons chopped green onions
• white rice

*Note that I doubled the recipe for my extremely large family.

Start by chopping all the veggies for the roux. Thanks to my sister Hannah for helping out with the photos on these...it really helped speed up the chopping process.

Celery...

green bell peppers...

red bell peppers...

p.s. Can we please stop to take notice of the smallest cutting board in the world. This is the only cutting board at our house in Port O'Connor. I know what I am getting my Dad for Christmas.

and the onions (shout out to Rhonda for saving my eyes and chopping the onions for me)...

Set the roux veggies aside.

Chop up the garlic and set aside.

Chop tomatoes, parsley, and thyme and set aside.

Peel and devein the shrimp. If you have a champion shrimp peeler/deveiner for a Dad, feel free to tag him in for this step.

Now that everything is prepped, it is time to get cookin.

Melt the butter in a large pot over medium-high heat. It doesn't hurt if you have one on hand that happened to belong to your Great-Grandmother from Louisiana. Dad told me she would have been really proud of my shrimp etouffee :).

Add the flour to make a roux and cook, stirring frequently, until it turns into a peanut butter color.

Since achieving a peanut butter color can take quite a while, I highly recommend having a glass of wine handy.

Note that the picture below is before it was taken before it was totally done, and I completely forgot to take a pic when it was completely PB color...I blame the glass of wine.

Add the onions, celery, bell peppers, salt, and pepper. Cook, stirring, until the vegetables are soft (about five minutes).

Add the garlic and cook for about a minute.

Add the water and stir.

Add the Essence and bay leaves and reduce heat to medium.

Add the tomatoes, wine, parsley, and thyme, and cook, stirring, for five minutes.

Have another sip of your wine and smell the deliciousness that is going on at this point.

Reduce to a simmer and cook, stirring, until the mixture thickens (about five minutes).

At this point, you can add more water if you prefer thinner etouffee.

It kind of looks like restaurant-style queso at this point. Mmmmm....queso (I will save that for a later post).

Add the shrimp and cook until they just curl and turn pink (about three to four minutes). Add the green onions and cook for two minutes.

Remove from the heat and remove the bay leaves.

Serve over rice. Some nice crusty bread to soak up all the extra goodness is also necessary.

This really is so good. And, although it was great during our summer vacation, this meal is even more fabulous on a cold and rainy night. Enjoy :).