Jambalaya

About a week ago, we gave in and, bought a dutch oven from Costco. We almost bought a dutch oven from amazon, but once we saw the one at Costco we knew we had to have it. It was more than 9 quarts (I just wrote this out as courts), pre-seasoned for 40 bucks. Great deal right? Well, we’ve already used it twice, because we can. And we can’t wait to take it camping with us. We’re especially excited to make cobbler, which is so easy and always tastes so good.

I keep typing jambalaya and spelling it jumbalaya (isn’t that how its pronounced – it should be spelled like that anyway!)

I found the base of my recipe from foodnetwork. But we changed it up, to make it better for us, by adding more meat and no hot sauce and such. So here ya go:

1/2 lb small shrimp, tails removed

2 large chicken breasts, cubed in bite size pieces
1 1/4 TBS Creole seasoning (which cannot be found with the spices, but instead near (oh shoot, now I can’t remember, Asian pre-made food) something)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 onion, chopped

1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
3 stalks celery, chopped

2 tablespoons chopped garlic
1 can diced tomatoes
3 bay leaves
2 TBS Worchestershire sauce
1 cup rice, uncooked
3 cups chicken stock
3 spicy sausages, sliced (the size of brats or hotdogs)

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1. Cook rice. (We did it in a rice cooker, but a pot would work too)

2. In a large bowl, combine shrimp, chicken and sausage.

3. Mix creole seasoning, salt and pepper in with meats.

4. In a pan, saute onion, pepper and celery with olive oil, for about 3 minutes.

5. Combine sauteed vegetables, meats, garlic, tomatoes, bay leaves and Worcestershire sauce.

6. Stir in rice, and chicken broth.

7. Pour mixture into dutch oven.

8. Cook until meat is done, about 30 minutes. Stirring occasionally.

* Warning, do not have your feeble wife, life the lid of the dutch oven, charcoal will spill EVERYWHERE including into your delicious meal. Oops. (I promise from now on, Nate will be the one to lift the lid.) After picking out the large pieces of charcoal, we enjoyed our meal with a few small speckles of charcoal dust. It just adds character, right?

P.S. I’m sure you could cook this in a pot over the stove, if you don’t have a dutch oven.

Besides the charcoal dust, the meal tasted really good. I picked out the shrimp from my bowl, and added them to Nate’s, but luckily there was no sea food taste throughout. This made enough for the 3 of us to each have a big bowlful, and we froze about half of it. Although this probably isn’t a meal I’ll make every month, we’ll definitely make this every few months or so. Try it.