Recipe - Teal Or Poule Deau Gumbo

ROUX
3 tablespoon Shortening
1 lg Onion
2 tablespoon Flour
2 Toes garlic
1 Bay leaf
1 pn Thyme
Parsley
Salt and pepper to taste

GUMBO
2 Poules d'eau or teal; up to
3
Shortening for sauteing
2 Dozen oysters with water
(optional)
4 cup Water; up to 6
File powder
Cooked rice

Add flour to shortening. Cook over low heat. Stir constantly, to avoid
scorching, until very brown. Add onions, garlic, bay leaf, thyme, parsley,
salt and pepper.

Skin poule d'eau or teal, wash, cut up, salt and pepper. Fry lightly and
set aside. Make basic roux, add poule d'eau or teal and water. Simmer for
about two hours or until tender. If using, add oysters and oyster water (be
sure and pick over them by hand for pearls and bits of shell, and strain
the water.) Add file individually when ready to serve. Serve over rice.

Note: do not add file to a rapidly boiling pot or it will string (file
means thread). If you wish to season the entire pot, bring the temperature
down to a bare simmer, remove some liquid, let it cool and stir in the
file; then stir the mixture back into the pot. Do not bring it to a rolling
boil again.

from "New Orleans Lenten Recipes: A MultiEthnic Sampling" by Elaine Abboud
Mowad and Jean Sarrazin Sears, published in 1970 by the Louisiana Folklore
Society. The booklet contains recipes passed down from generation to
generation by word of mouth.

printed in The New Orleans TimesPicayune, March 2, 1995

Posted to MMRecipes Digest V4 #192 by Linda Place
placel@worldnet.att.net on Jul 17, 1997