re: Another Seafood Gumbo Failure

quote:

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The reason for this is seafood cooks quickly...as in minutes. Shrimp will turn into pencil erasers if over cooked. Oysters will get tough and chewy. Lump or other crab meat will shred and basically disappear.

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So I’m reminded that barely cooked seafood isn’t the only way to fly. Big shrimp, in a gumbo, will get chewy. That’s why you should use small shrimp...aka gumbo shrimp. Yes, they’ll be technically cooked in a flash, but let em keep cooking and they will take on an entirely different texture....a slightly dissolving succulence, saturated with gumbo juice. This is not bad, or wrong....or even “overcooked”. It’s the texture of shrimp actually cooked in a gumbo, as opposed to shrimp dropped in at the last minute that are merely poached in a gumbo.

Again, old school home style aesthetic vs a restaurant aesthetic. Plenty of old school bayou cajuns boil the hell out of gumbo featuring small shrimp and plenty of bayou cajun eaters have an appreciation for a texture that some would call overcooked.

Re crabmeat, use cheaper (but flavorful) claw meat early in the cooking, then add some special white lump toward the end.