re: Jambalaya- In what order do you brown your meat?

You can’t handle big batches, sweetie?

Pork and chicken first, sausage next. I pretty much turn the pork/chicken into cracklins then only lightly brown the sausage.

Only brown the pork. I don't take anything "out" of the pot except grease. Sausage goes in when the onions make all of their water. The sausage comes out a bit fluffier and there's no extra time or added mess.

If it’s competition, yes, draining and skimming is a must and there are visually indicators that can usually tell you when it’s enough.

This is the way

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So you are draining after the browning process and skimming when you had the broth?

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Correct, when doing a chicken jambalaya, the hen is usually “fried” in a larger amount of oil which definitely requires draining. Pork need far less oil, so I don’t drain that. Both cases need skimming before rice is put in.

It'll just be a little more unhealthy

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This is where you will really get your fond built up, which is your color for the dish. It will make a bunch of liquid at first but cook that out, let the bottom get a little sticky, then add some water or stock to deglaze. Let that water cook out again and the bottom to form your fond again.

Push the pork up the sides and add cut-up chicken thighs

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GeauxTigers0107, I have questions.
So you are deglazing with the pork still in the pot and then let the stock cook off to form the fond again, then you put chicken in there to brown?
How do you keep your pork from burning while doing all this?

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So you are deglazing with the pork still in the pot and then let the stock cook off to form the fond again

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Yeah. The only thing that ever comes out of my pot is the bacon. I fry that first. When you pour a little water/stock in to deglaze you will start braising the pork, which gets it tender. As far as keeping it from burning, I run a low fire and stir often, without scraping the bottom.

When I add the stock and scape the bottom clean I'll usually put the lid on for 15 minutes to keep some of my liquid in for tenderizing purposes. Then remove the lid and let the liquid cook out. Stir the pork but don't scrape the bottom. You need that dark sticky fond to build back up again but not get black.

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then you put chicken in there to brown?

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Yeah. I'll push the pork up the sides all the way around to open up the bottom and dump the chicken in. It will release a lot of water that you will use to deglaze the bottom of your pot again. But I don't ever "brown" my chicken. I just cook it for 15-20 minutes until I don't see any raw chicken, stirring occasionally.

I run a low fire until I add my final liquids. When that's in, I crank it to high and stir often to ensure the bottom of the pot stays clean. Once I get a good boil going, rice goes in, fire still on pretty high and stir damn near constantly. Longest it will go unstirred is probably 30-45 seconds.

Sausage first always. The fat renders so you can brown the chicken in the fat. That’s where you get your brown color.

My dad, long gone now, used to cook Jambalaya almost every weekend for a second income. Sometimes for a couple hundred and sometimes for a thousand.

We cooked for a thousand people for Edwin Edward’s first inauguration on the LSU campus. I was his helper at that event at 18. I started helping at the age of 10.

My job was to cut the sausage. Hi Nabor cut the chickens and onions for us. We used Martin’s sausage when it was a true smoke house. Since they were bought it’s not the same.

If you want true smoked sausage in thr BR area go to Benoit’s. That’s what Martin’s used to taste like.

I miss my dad dearly and will forever remember those times with him. I still have many of his pots in my garage that are over 100 years old.