Years ago, while visiting the Seattle area for a music conference, we ate at a most impressive restaurant in Redmond, Washington. “The Celtic Bayou” is a mash-up of Irish pub food and Louisiana cajun dishes. Strange combo, but incredibly successful.
I’ve never been to Louisiana to try authentic cajun cooking, but every meal I ate in Ireland topped my favourites list. After several meals at the celtic/cajun restaurant, I knew there was a future in that style of cooking.
Curling up on the sofa with a bowl of spicy warmth and a slice of herbed garlic gluten-free bread makes my carb-craving winter-cocooning person so happy.
The practical inspiration for Celtic Jambalaya came from a church cookbook – one of the best places to find tried-tested-true recipes. Church cookbooks document how real families eat, and those recipes make good “blueprints” for creatively adding a personal touch to the dish.
The jambalaya recipe in the First Baptist Church cookbook was submitted by Jodi – the coolest, most athletic, fun, beautiful optometrist ever.
Jambalaya is typically made with 3 foundational parts: meat, veggies, and rice – almost like a Louisiana hotdish. Gumbo, on the other hand, is a soup containing many of the same ingredients as jambalaya, but is served over rice.
One of the key vegetables is bell peppers, which I’m allergic to. SO, that leaves the concept of jambalaya open for my personal interpretation. 🙂 The celtic twist comes from the vegetables I add. And just to confuse things a little bit more, I photograph it on a Swedish tablecloth.
Have some fun, be creative, and enjoy a dish of bi-continental comfort food.
PrintCeltic Jambalaya
- Total Time: 1 hour
- Yield: 10-12 1x
Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp oil
- 2 large onions, chopped
- 3 turnips, diced
- 3 carrots, diced
- 3 stalks celery, diced
- 6 cloves garlic, sliced
- 2 tsp thyme
- 2 tsp paprika
- 1 tsp ground allspice
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 cup dry white wine
- 1 can diced tomatoes
- 2 cups fresh tomatoes (cherry or grape tomatoes, cut in half)
- 3–4 cups low sodium chicken stock
- 2 1/2 cups brown rice
- 2 pounds cooked chicken, cut into bite-sized pieces
- 1 pound Andouille sausage (fully cooked) sliced
- 1 pound shrimp, thawed and tails removed
- Green onions and fresh parsley
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- In a large, oven-safe pot, sauté onions, celery, turnips, and carrots for 5 minutes in oil, then add garlic for another 2 minutes. (I use an enamaled cast-iron dutch oven with oven-safe lid.)
- Stir in the thyme, paprika, allspice, black pepper, salt, and cayenne, allowing the spices to coat the veggies and “toast” in the heat.
- Stir in the white wine, diced tomatoes, rice, and chicken stock. Then add the cooked chicken and Andouille sausage and bring to a boil.
- Once boiling, stir in the fresh tomatoes, cover the pot, and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
- Stir in the shrimp, green onions, and fresh parsley, cover, and bake another 5 minutes, or until shrimp is pink.
