1 post tagged “okra”

ingredients:

olive oil
flour
red onion
carrots
celery
okra
baby spinach leaves
vegetable broth
pasta
hot sauce
salt and pepper

step one:  making the roux

in a deep pot, heat some olive oil.  add flour an cook it in the oil until dark brown.  be careful that the roux doesn't burn.  i found that the easiest thing to do was to turn off the heat when it got golden brown, and the roux continued to cook off the heat until it got the color of milk chocolate.  this is perfect.

step two:  the veg

turn the heat back on, and immediately add chopped onion, carrot, an celery to the roux.  my roux had gotten a little tight, so i added some more olive oil before adding the veg.  stir the stuff through and add salt and pepper.  cook until soft.

i had picked up some nice fresh okra from the park slope farmer's market.  i've never cooke with fresh okra before, which is why i picked it up at the market.  it inspired me to make the gumbo in the first place.

step three:  add some tofu

instead of chicken, sausage, or seafood, i used tofu.  i cut the firm tofu in half long-wise, and then cut it into stips.  first i added it to the roux-veg mix, and stirred it through.  when the broth is added it firms the tofu up.

trim the ends off of the okra and cut into big pieces.  add the okra to the pot, season, and stir through.  cook the okra until it begins to soften.

step four:  add the broth

i use a kosher, parve fake chicken powder.  i mixed it in a pot of water on a seperate burner, and brought it up to a boil.  when it was boiling, i turned down the heat and left it at temperature.

when the okra is ready, pour the broth into the gumbo pot.  bring this to a boil.  it is important to boil this because this activates the thickening power of the roux.  i also added a few whole black peppercorns.

step five:  pasta

i added sriracha for hot sauce, because that's what i had around.

traditionally gumbo is served over rice, but i didn't have any.  instead i added corkscrew pasta.  in addition to adding body to the gumbo, i figure the starch from the pasta will help thicken the stuff.

step six:  finishing touches

when the pasta is cooked through, turn off the heat.  add a handful of fresh baby spinach leaves.  stir these through, and this will be enough to cook the spinach.

let the whole thing cool a bit -- it will thicken up really nicely.

step seven:  eat!