hi I'm chef Landrieu from Lake Charles Louisiana here in Cajun country we're well known for our gunboats where we take unique ingredients blend them together for a truly special dish just like our culture so today I'm going to show you how to make an authentic Louisiana gumbo what I have here in this pot is I have what we call the Cajun Trinity which is celery bell peppers and yellow onions and to that I'm going to add a little black pepper I'm going to add a little bit of salt and I'm going to add a little bit of garlic and then what kind of Cajun dish would it be without cayenne red pepper right so we're going to add a little Cayenne red pepper but not knowing where you guys are from if you're from north this should be enough cayenne pepper I actually season three times in the course of my cooking because I want those oils in that spice to be omitted from the spice they're going to call my eyes it's going to give me a particular flavor of those four spices as they cook and I add my stalks and continue to cook it and they release our oils in the boiling water I'm going to get a totally different flavor from the same four spices while we're waiting on our gumbo to come to a boil let's make what makes gumbo all Finnick let's make a homemade roux and first off I've got some Louisiana cooking all in here going to add just a little bit of water to it as it approaches 220 degrees it's going to start snap crackling and popping because water and oil does not mix as you can hear it's beginning to snap as we talk as you can hear the water is really beginning to pop and boil out of this oil as it approaches 220 degrees it's going to get completely silenced again that means all the water is boiled out of this pond but since it's almost there I'm going to go in - flower - that you'll notice it I'm standing right over it you can continue in the stir because that's the thing about flower and oil if you leave it for a minute it's going to scorch and a little bit of scorched fruit goes a long long way I'm here to tell you now if you were making an etouffee or something like that this rule would be done but since you're making a gumbo which is going to be a dark rich Brown which is going to get more flower taste more everything adds body to your gumbo as you're thickening agent does a whole lot for you you just keep stirring this until it turns deep brown now what we want to do is trim up the fat off our chicken and as you'll notice I have turned my hands down and won the night off the back of my fingers by running them off the back of the fingers and moving your fingers at the same spot all your chicken is cut to the same size therefore you don't have big pieces that are undercooked and little pieces that are overcooked they're all cooking at the same speed now remember earlier we took our room and we cooked it down till it was a rich fudge brown then we put it in the refrigerator and cool it to room temperature and now we're going to add it to our to our gumbo now a lot of people want to know how much rule you put in again one and I'm going to tell you exactly like my grandmother used to say you put a little bit shine but not a lot you put just enough brew is one of the few things that you can put in boiling stock or water and it'll go straight to the bottom of the pot and burn so what I'm going to do is stir it and keep stirring it till it completely melts in my gumbo and as you can see the color of my gumbo has changed the thickness of my gumbo has already started to change and it just gets better and better from there yep gumbo now according to my grandmother if you stick your finger in the pot of rice and it comes up to the first knuckle you bring the water up to the second to the third knuckle and bring it to a boil and you'll have it other recipes say pound of rice quart of water and then of course a little bit of butter because that's how your mother used to do it turn it on high stir it off the bottom of the pot put a lid on it once this rice comes to a boil turn it off let it sit for 30 minutes perfect rice every time now this is a good gumbo but if you want a great gumbo what you do is you eat all you want the first day put it in the refrigerator and cool it down the next day it's going to have a grease layer on it scrape the grease layer off then bring it back to a rolling boil and then you have a great gumbo don't ask me what happens in the refrigerator but there's a metamorphosis that occurs where the spices and the liquids and the meat all blend together to give you a really great gumbo the second day I really do hope you've enjoyed this little taste of Louisiana culture for more information visit you