Shrimp Etouffee

Shrimp Etouffee.............what can I say......YUM! I lived down in the New Orleans area for a few years 21 or so years ago. My first son was born down there. Louisiana is an experience like none. You truly feel like you have left the country in many ways. The deep history and culture that exists down there is amazing. I will be honest with you I'm glad I don't live there anymore (the heat and humidity are terrible) but I'm also glad I got to spend a few years there to experience what Louisiana (New Orleans in particular) had to offer.
The food is a culinary dream. It is the best southern eating to be had. The fresh fish and shrimp (crawfish too) are amazing. I will be honest I was never able to make myself suck the head off a boiled crawfish.....just couldn't do it folks. I did however have wonderful food and experiences. Etouffee was one of my favorite foods. I was never much on the Gumbo or sucking the crawfish heads but give me a good bowl of Shrimp (or Crawfish) Etouffee and I was very content.
Basically Etouffee roughly translates to smothered, stewed, or braised. Etouffee translates to wonderful to me. I can't give direct credit for my recipe to any one person as I spent many hours reading recipes and putting together what appeared to be the best from them all. There are going to be some loyal Etouffee lovers who will not like some of what I put in mine as it breaks with tradition but adds up to wonderful. As you can imagine any one culture with deep roots in cooking and recipes might not appreciate having them altered. But good is good. Now I am going to try a couple of different things the next time I make this. Not because this wasn't great because it was GREAT! Just because I want to see what adding a couple of different ingredients I read about will do. For instance the "to add tomatoes" or not is a debate. I read a few recipes with Worcestershire sauce in them but I didn't use it. I also used clam juice. Horror of horrors for any native Louisianan. They aren't big into clams down there but they love a good oyster. The reason for the clam juice is I didn't want to hassle with making shrimp stock and so I used clam juice. Guess what it worked great. So if you are from Louisiana and I have irritated your sense of cooking loyalty I humbly apologize for that but I don't apologize for this great dish. Here's what I did......

THE SECRET TO A GOOD ETOUFFEE IS A GOOD ROUX. VERY IMPORTANT!

Shrimp Etouffee- Serves 10-12 generous (don't forget I feed a family of Sasquatches. Plus we like leftovers.)
Before I start cooking the etouffee I put my rice in my rice cooker and get it cooking. You want plenty of white rice to pour you shrimp etouffee over.

2 sticks of butter
1 1/2 Cups all purpose flour
1 red bell pepper, diced (how small is a personal thing. I prefer my pieces really small.)
1 orange (whatever color you want. I'm not a big green bell pepper person so I never use them.) bell pepper,diced.
2 Cups celery, diced
4 cloves garlic, chopped (I will probably add more next time. But this amount was good.)
4 Cups onion, diced.
1 Cup bacon, chopped
1/2 Cup chopped parsley
1 1/2-2 Cups beer (I used Coors light because that is what I had.)
4 Cups clam juice
4 Cups chicken stock
2 bay leaves
3 1/2 Tbl. Cajun Seasoning (I used Ragin' Cajun brand)
2 Cap fulls of crab/shrimp boil (this is spicy. Add more to taste. I used Zatarain's boil)
1/2 tsp white pepper
1 tsp. salt (to taste. check for seasoning at the end and then add this.)
good pinch of cayenne pepper
2 pounds shrimp (I purchased fresh caught never frozen shrimp. I had to clean and devein them.)

In a heavy stock pot placed over med-high heat add the bacon and cook till just done. Remove bacon and leave bacon drippings in pan. Turn heat down to med. and add both sticks of butter. After butter has melted add the flour and stir. It will seem thick and weird for a while as it cooks and starts to loosen up the bacon residue on bottom of the pan. After all that lifts it will thin out some. Stir constantly while the roux cooks and browns. This is very important to how your etouffee comes out. You don't want to cook your roux too quickly or under cook it or burn it. If you under cook it you lose a lot of flavor. If you over cook it your etouffee will taste burnt. So low and slow. This can take 15-30 minutes depending on your stove and pot etc... Stir constantly till it is a rich caramel color (or little darker than the color of peanut butter.) Once it hits the stage of browing it will go quickly so be alert. Once it hits this stage add in your bells peppers, onion, celery (this is considered the "Holy Trinity" in Louisiana cooking.) Add the garlic, cooked bacon and parsley. Stir this all around in the roux and cook for a couple of minutes. Then deglaze your pan with the beer and add all the clam juice and chicken broth. Stir to get roux dissolved and then add bay leaves, cajun seasoning, shrimp boil, white pepper, ceyanne and stir. Save the salt for later. Right now it will taste highly seasoned but the flavors mellow a lot during cooking. Bring to a simmer and cover. Simmer slowly for about 30 minutes stirring often as the veggies will have a tendency to sink to the bottom and you don't want them to stick. While this is simmering clean your shrimp and I cut each one up into a bite size peice. Your sauce will thicken to a wonderful gravy consistency. Once your there throw in the raw cleaned shrimp and allow to cook another 10 minutes or so. Then taste for salt. I did add 1 tsp. of salt and ended up salting it again after if was on my rice. Just follow your taste buds here.
Thats it kids. Shrimp Etouffe. I'm going to play around with it some by adding the tomatoes (very little) and maybe a dash of Worcestershire sauce (my sister-in-law would be proud. She loves her some Worcestershire sauce. Sending the love to Sandra.)
Anyway serve over cooked white rice. We had this with some fresh baked artisan bread with a great Wisconsin butter and cold beer. Was a great meal.