Customer Reviews

Gumbo Shop : A New Orleans Restaurant Cookbook

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

My copy of "Gumbo Shop" arrived in the mail last week, and I could hardly wait to prepare one of my favorite dishes, Shrimp Creole. After declaring the dish, "the best thing that I've eaten all year," a friend of mine, a Creole Cuisine novice,went on to ask the secret of the rich taste. I went on to explain the process of making a roux, and the technique of "sticking and scraping". "A depth of flavor unfolds that cannot be achieved otherwise," I insisted, giving full credit for the recipe and the quote, of course, to Chef Richard Stewart. The complexity of flavors is the secret to Creole Cuisine, and New Orleans is the birthplace, a city of diverse cultures that melds in its fantastic food. Every memorable dish that visitors long to savor upon arriving in the Crescent City is divulged in this cookbook, with mouth-watering photographs throughout. Having lived there for a year in the Seventies, I developed a passion for the intense tastes, and now I can indulge myself and my friends in my own kitchen. Thank you, Chef Richard Stewart, for a beautiful book. .

I was motivated to write this review when I read another review from a person in Alexandria, VA, who said the recipes and the restaurant was for tourists and that a native from Louisiana would never use it. I was born and raised in Louisiana and my mother was raised in New Orleans. I have tested almost every recipe in this book and 90% of them are, in my opinion, fabulous. This is how my grandmother's dishes tasted when I was a little girl. It's the real thing, not gourmet, but how many "normal" people are gourmet cooks? After family and friends sample a recipe, they either ask how they can get the cookbook or ask for the recipe. I've purchased around 10 as gifts. In fact, that's why I was on the site today... buying another copy!

My wife grew up in New Orleans and I lived there for a decade- We've been cooking from the standard books for years (Prudhomme, Patout, Cathedral cookbook, etc.), but until we tried the recipes from the Gumbo Shop, we were never quite satisfied. These recipes are straightforward, authentic and best of all, produce the wonderful depths of flavor we all love about New Orleans Creole cooking. Regardless of whether you ever visit the restaurant, the Gumbo Shop cookbook is a must.

A Great read in addition to some of the purest and most delicious secret recipes ever made available. This is a masterpiece on the evolution of just what makes a New Orleanian and Southerner, well, unique, through Food. It is why we 'live to eat'!

Having visited the Gumbo Shop in New Orleans I just had to get the recipe for their Gumbo Z'herbs. It was awesome at the restaurant and almost awesome when I followed the recipe. I guess a recipe doesn't make you a great chef. Anyway, the pictures are wonderful and almost all of the recipes are easy to follow with great results.

I have to totally disagree with "A Customer" whose review says the recipes are "pedestrian, touristy fair". Traveling to New Orleans regularly on business since 1981, I have had an opportunity to eat at many restaurants in the region over these 30 years. I'm an avid cook with a large cookbook collection and feel the Gumbo Shop Cookbook represents true Creole cooking: ingredients, preparation methods and presentation styles. My friends and acquaintances in New Orleans, mostly locals, agree that this cookbook is outstanding. Notably, it was a fourth generation New Orleanian that gave me the book as a special present when I expressed an interest in the Creole cuisine years ago. I highly recommend the Gumbo Shop Cookbook.

I chatted briefly with the author in a shop in New Orleans and ended up taking this book home with me. Now I am burning through these recipes and haven't encountered one yet that is not spectacular. I have a handful of other New Orleans/Creole/Cajun cookbooks, but this one is different. It's basic, clear, and sound. It teaches you how to prepare the classics -- and cultivate deep, complex flavors from the beginning of each recipe rather than adding ingredients that simply turn up the heat. You feel as if you understand the basic chords of this cuisine. Now you can riff if you want! Oh, my goodness, I could live on Gumbo Z'Herbes. Kudos and thanks to the author.

I've only tried the shrimp creole but it was delicious and just like the ones I had in new orleans. The only problem might be for this book is the serving sizes are so huge for two people sometimes you need to cut the recipe in half or even more.

This is not a cookbook for the gourmets. This is for everyday people who love food made with ingredients readily available on the Gulf Coast. And the recipes really do yield results that taste like the restaurant's dishes. I've had the Crawfish Etouffe recipe made in Pennsylvania, and it was an exact duplicate of what I order at the restaurant.

Eat at the Gumbo Shop whenever you can. The rest of the time, use their cookbook.

Caroline Jumper

San Jose

We ate at the Gumbo Shop in August 2004 and had a really good meal there--not great, but really good, and we decided to get a copy of their cookbook since we like cooking Louisiana-style food at home.

We were pleasantly surprised when the recipes we made from this book actually came out tasting better than the food we had at the restaurant! The bread pudding and praline sundae recipes are now among our favorites, and the recipes are all well-written and easy to follow. This book has gotten so much use in the past year and a half that we're buying another copy (the one we have is hopelessly stained and worn from too many kitchen spills.)