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Gumbo with Mogettes de Vendée (v)
Cajun food, starring the humble Vendée mogette As a long-time expat and having lived many places, multi-cultural meals are a normal part of what I cook. Secretly I think it’s one of the reasons my husband is fond of me. 😉 We enjoy an international kitchen! It’s inspiring to prepare something that you know will evoke a memory, or certain flavors on the palete, that represents somewhere you’ve been on holiday or have lived for a while. In fact. Gumbo is a perfect example of migration and the merging of cultures, combined with what is available locally, to create something entirely different and exciting. According to scholars, the dish originates in the 18th century and is first described in the early 19th (1802). The word likely knows its origin in Africa and refers to the okra vegetable which acts as a thickening agent. Gumbo is a type of stew that …
Chicken Chili with Mogettes
Whilst I’m a very selective fan of the slow cooker, there are some meals that just demand to be prepared that way. This chicken chili is definitely one of them, but I would never cook a lovely Texas Chili Con Carne or Spaghetti sauce in a slow cooker. They demand a thickness that this chicken chili doesn’t really need. So, as the fall/winter season knocks on the kitchen door, this is definitely an easy favorite in our family. The original recipe is not mine, but I have adapted it e.g. to include our Vendéen mogettes, and I have also devised a vegetarian version which I’ll share at a later date. Note: I made this while on holiday, and shopping for ingredients locally, I was lucky to find canned black beans – otherwise I would have made dry black beans first and then rinsed them. The mogettes I had with me …
Regional Cuisine with Mogettes
Recently it was suggested to my mother-in-law that she go through a radical life change to address some health issues: to stop eating things that have a face. Or is derived from them. The diagnosis came right before my parents-in-law would visit us in the Vendée, and so the challenge to find meals a diabetic with heart issues could eat, was on. As a part-time vegetarian myself, I knew it would not be an easy feat in this area. But we found the local white kidney bean, called mogette in French, would serve the purpose of a fiber -and protein rich diet well. Even in restaurants, the ham that is typically served as part of this local delicacy, is traditionally prepared on the side. At the end of August 2018, we attended la fête de l’agriculture de Vendée in La Chataigneraie. Wonderfully, the in-season crops had been grown in an on-site demonstration. About the …