Fat Tuesday Favorites: A cooking class featuring New Orleans Mardi Gras favorites

Beignets anyone?

Chef Danielle Turner's Fat Tuesday Favorites class syllabus on the L'Academie de Cuisine website piqued my curiosity. I was born in Louisiana as were my parents. My parents cooked some popular dishes associated with New Orleans/ Cajun dining when I was a child. I even helped my mother prep the vegetables she would use in many of her dishes. Yes, I was the kid whose hands reeked of onion, celery and bell pepper (aka the holy trinity of Cajun cooking or the mirepoix of Louisiana Creole cooking). Would this class teach me how to make the oft talked about beignets or oyster po'boy that my mother talked about eating as a young woman?

A snowstorm passed through the DC metro area the day before class and many areas were still clearing roadways and walkways the day of the class. Instead of 10 participants, there were 5 participants.

On the class menu:

Barbecued Shrimp

Chicken & Sausage Gumbo;

Fried Oyster Po' Boys

Beignets

Our first task was blending the ingredients for the beignet dough and then set it aside to allow the dough additional time to rise and expand.

We  moved on to the chicken and sausage gumbo. I scanned the recipe to see if okra was a listed ingredient (it's one of the few vegetables I'm not fond of. I remember once trying to extract the okra from bowl of gumbo  and my mother saw me - BIG mistake. I was told not to eat the gumbo unless I was willing to eat whatever was  placed in my bowl). I found no okra listed in the ingredients for class- whew!

We used red pepper instead of green pepper in our gumbo. Chef Turner recommended using chicken thighs and seasoning the meat well because they will absorb the flavors of the dish. Chicken stock, tomatoes, and a small bit of tomato paste were added to the cooked  peppers, cooked chicken and cooked sausage.

gumbo simmering



gumbo is served

Once the gumbo ingredients were simmering we began preparing the barbecue shrimp. It was simple, easy and quick to prepare - a winning a combination in my book. The word barbecue refers to using a 'low and slow' heat to cook the shrimp once the sauce is prepared. As my classmate and I discovered using a  high heat to create the sauce burns the sauce quickly. Fortunately, the shrimp had not been added to the pan and  one of the class assistants brought another set of ingredients to us to re-create the sauce. When the sauce is mixed well the shrimp are added to the pan and the flame is lowered. When the shrimp were  done we were shown two ways to plate the dish: arrange slices of bread on a plate, arrange shrimp on the bread slices, pour the sauce over the shrimp and bread OR place shrimp in bowl, pour sauce over shrimp and garnish with bread slices. I decided to serve the dish by arranging the shrimp atop the bread slices.



barbecue shrimp

After enjoying the barbecue shrimp Chef Turner demonstrated how to preprare the oysters for frying. The oysters were marinading in their own jucies with a liberal amount of Tabasco added.  We used one (1) beaten egg, flour, and cornmeal. We dipped the oyster in the beaten egg first then the flour, followed by the cornmeal. It's a messy process, but the end result is so worth it - oysters with a crispy exterior and a tender, somewhat spicy interior. We were given sliced baguette bread, lettuce, tomato, red onion and remoulade one of Chef Turner's volunteer assistants prepared for the class using the recipe provided in the course syllabus.


fried oysters

po'boy prep

Before tonight's class I had never made beignets.  After setting the beignet dough aside so it could rise and expand we rolled the dough out about 1/4 inch thick and then cut the dough into similarly sized pieces. The pieces of cut dough were deep fried and when done (the dough must be flipped over) were liberally dusted with powdered sugar. Delicious and addictive! Overall, the process reminded me of what I had done in another cooking class to make donuts, excluding placing the dough in a proofer to encourage the dough to rise more.

frying beignets

Chef Turner discovered that a recipe for bananas foster had mistakenly been included in the class syllabus she submitted for printing. She prepared the dish as a bonus for us.

I enjoyed the class and learned new techniques as Chef Turner's presentation style makes it easy to repeat the steps she demonstrates. She also encourages students to ask questions.

Merci!