There are countless different recipes for the southern Louisiana stew jambalaya and multiple apocryphal explanations of its name, among them:
Jambon (French for “ham”) + a la + ya (West African term for “rice”). The problems with this explanation are that ham is a rare jambalaya ingredient and ya means “sorghum.”
Jamón (Spanish for “ham”) + paella.
Jambalaia means “chaos” in Provençal.
Balayer is the Creole verb for whipping something together.
A cook named Jean was once asked to make a quick dish from whatever was on hand, the command being: “Jean, balayez,” which eventually was bastardized to jambalaya.
Despite the chaos and confusion that surrounds the dish—and frequently defines what is in the cook pot—there basically are two different styles. Creole jambalaya was, in fact, a version of Spanish paella in which tomatoes were substituted for saffron. Cajun jambalaya, which contains no tomatoes, tends to be a hunter’s stew made with whatever swamp country critters are available, plus sausage. Like gumbo, jambalaya is aggressively seasoned, partly by the smoked and spiced meats it contains, but also by the cook who stirs it in the big iron pot using a paddle or shovel. The technical difference between jambalaya and gumbo is that in the latter, rice always is cooked separately and combined with the soup for serving. When making jambalaya, the rice is cooked with everything else, sopping up different flavors. But a more important distinction between the two is that gumbo can be thought of as quite sophisticated; jambalaya is a people’s dish, often served at big picnics, fairs, and community parties.