Food Therapy

Food Therapy is not sitting in front of the TV while gorging yourself with absurd amounts of chocolate, or ice cream, or both.  Food Therapy is feeling the sharp blade slide through the holy trinity of vegetables as you try to forget the chaos from the day.  It's methodically mapping out which ingredients to combine in order to make a divine meal worthy of forgiving all the madness of our human existence.  Food Therapy is recognizing the connection between our nutritional needs and spiritual hunger.  For me, cooking takes on a much more powerful meaning than something to fill your gut with.  For me, cooking soothes the soul and awakens my inner peaceful spirit.  That is unless...Chew Eat Yet?

After an eventful day with 75 sixth graders from (Blessed) JPII, I was more than ready to get into the kitchen for some food therapy.  Using some leftover crawfish tails from our 24 Hour Famine Crawfish Boil, I decided to make Crawfish (and Shrimp)  Étouffée.

The Recipe (for a 5 gallon pot)
As many pounds of peeled crawfish tails (or shrimp) as possible (roughly 5 lbs)
3 Bell Peppers
3 Large Onions
6 Tomatoes
2 Lemons (Juiced)
6 Celery Stocks
5 Garlic Cloves (minced)
2 cans of Rotel HOT
2 can tomato sauce
2 cans secret stuff (tweet at me for the secret)
1 stick of butter
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup vegetable oil

Dice the vegetables.

In your pot, add 1/3 cup oil and turn on medium/high heat.  Add flour and stir continuously until the flour browns.  This is your roux.  Be sure not to burn it.  Add the onions, bell peppers, celery and garlic and cook this mixture down.  Add butter and cook until vegetables are "clear" or "soft".  Add roughly chopped tomatoes and lemon juice.  Allow this to mix well.  Then add ROTEL, sauce and secret cans.  I will call the secret "Mayonnaise" but like I said, you can tweet at me, email me, facebook me, call me, skype me.....anyways.  Mix this for a while.  Salt and Pepper to taste.  Once this comes to a boil, add your crawfish tails. or shrimp, or oyster, or whatever you want really.  once again, salt and pepper to taste.  Served over rice.

Happy Plates!