Add Louisiana flavor to your New Year's menu with jambalaya

Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya is perfect for New Year’s and upcoming Carnival season festivities that start on Jan. 6. It’s easy to make and produces amazing leftovers. I like serving this delicious recipe with Southern Cornbread Sticks and collard greens for a traditional New Year’s Day fare or a Mardi Gras-inspired dinner.

About Jambalaya

Jambalaya is a one-pot dish that hails from Louisiana. It typically contains sausage, rice, and the holy trinity of onions, celery, bell pepper, and garlic. Generally, the bread of choice to serve with Jambalaya is cornbread.

Jambalaya can be either Creole with the addition of tomatoes or Cajun when made without tomatoes. Once the basic ingredients are added, the final dish can be varied by adding protein such as shrimp or crawfish, chicken, or for this recipe, black-eyed peas.

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Ingredients: Here’s what you’ll need

Sausage: My favorite sausage to use in the Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya is Conecuh’s original smoked sausage. This sausage is readily available in the grocery stores where I live.

Holy Trinity: The holy trinity consists of onions, celery, bell pepper, and garlic. Sometimes, garlic is referred to as the “pope”!

Rice: The best rice to use in this recipe is long-grain rice that has been rinsed and drained well.

Tomatoes: For the tomatoes, I used a can of undrained petite diced tomatoes.

Additional Liquid: The petite diced tomatoes add some liquid to the jambalaya. For the rest of the liquid, I used chicken broth.

Black-Eyed Peas: In this recipe, I used canned black-eyed peas.

The Rest of the Ingredients: I like to add a bit of olive oil for sauteing the holy trinity. For the seasonings, I used Creole seasoning, Kosher salt, black pepper, and dried thyme.

The Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya is amazingly delicious. The leftovers are equally awesome.

Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya

Serves 8

Ingredients

1 pound (16 ounces) smoked sausage

1 Tablespoon olive oil

¾ cup chopped onions (1 small to medium onion)

¾ cup chopped celery (about 3 stalks)

¾ cup chopped bell pepper (1 medium)

2 teaspoons Creole seasoning

1 teaspoon Kosher salt

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

¼ teaspoon dried thyme

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 ½ cups uncooked long-grain rice, rinsed and drained

1 can (14.5 ounces) petite diced tomatoes, undrained

3 cups chicken broth

2 cans (15.5 ounces each) of black-eyed peas, rinsed and drained

Directions

Cut smoked sausage into slices that are about ⅛-inch. Cook over medium heat in a Dutch oven. Remove from the Dutch oven and drain well on paper towels. Pour fat from the Dutch oven.

Heat one tablespoon of olive oil in the same Dutch oven used to cook the sausage. Add the onions, celery, and bell pepper. Cook over medium heat, scraping up the browned bits from the bottom of the Dutch oven, for about 10 minutes or until tender.

Stir in minced garlic, Creole seasoning, salt, pepper, and thyme. Cook for 30 seconds or until the garlic is fragrant.

Stir in uncooked rice; cook for about 2 minutes. Add undrained petite diced tomatoes; stir to combine. Continue scraping up browned bits from the bottom of the Dutch oven.

Add chicken broth and cooked sausage; stir to combine. Bring to a boil. Cover the Dutch oven with a paper towel and lid. Reduce heat to medium-low. Cook for 15 minutes.

Remove the lid and paper towel. Add rinsed and drained black-eyed peas; stir to combine. Cover the pan with a clean paper towel and lid. Cook for an additional 10 minutes or until the rice is done.

Remove the paper towel and lid. Let the jambalaya sit for five minutes. Fluff with a fork and serve.

Yield: 8 servings.

Recipe tips and tricks

When I make a rice dish, such as jambalaya, I always cover the pan with a paper towel before placing the lid on it. The reason is that the condensation from cooking the rice gets trapped between the paper towel and the lid. Otherwise, the condensation falls back on the rice, causing the rice to become mushy.

Sometimes if I have leftover Hoppin’ John, I’ll use three cups in the Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya instead of the canned black-eyed peas.

For a spicier jambalaya, I sometimes will substitute an undrained can of Rotel Original Diced Tomatoes & Green Chilies for the Petite Diced Tomatoes.

I like to make my own Creole seasoning using Emeril’s Essence recipe (recipe available online). I’ve never used a store-bought Creole seasoning.

Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya makes excellent leftovers. Refrigerate covered Jambalaya for several days and reheat it in the microwave.

Chula King is the blogger behind PudgeFactor.com.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Add Creole flavor to New Year's with Black-Eyed Pea Jambalaya