MILLER UNION |
Atlanta, Georgia |
Every port city has a great seafood one-pot, and in my hometown of Savannah we have the Lowcountry Boil. Its supposed inventor, Richard Gay, whose family runs a fish company in the community of Frogmore on St. Helena Island, gave it its other name, Frogmore stew, which is weirdly misleading. What you have here is not a conventional stew, in which the cooking liquid becomes a rich sauce. In this case, the seasoned liquid is merely a means of getting flavor into the ingredients and providing a gentle way of cooking. Then it’s all about the newspaper. Traditionally, this dish is served on big steaming platters set down on clean newspaper, which becomes the fish wrap for all your castoffs. Just eat and enjoy, plunking down your shrimp shells and corncobs—it’ll only take a minute to roll up the newspaper and throw everything away. There are even places along the South Carolina coastline where you eat your Frogmore stew at long wooden tables that have a hole in the center, with a trash can underneath: Peel, throw, eat.
This is an ideal meal for a big crowd at a summer house. You can batch it up or down, depending on the size of the group—don’t worry about perfectly portioning each ingredient. It’s the cooking time for each ingredient that matters. That, and making sure there’s enough beer.
SERVES
12
LEVEL of DIFFICULTY
WORTH THE EFFORT |
REASONABLE |
EASY |
BROTH
2 gl/7.5 L water
Two 12-oz/360-ml bottles beer (whatever you’re drinking while you prep)
1/2 cup/30 g Old Bay seasoning
3 tbsp kosher salt
2 bay leaves
6 large stalks celery, cut in half crosswise (inner leafy stalks are best)
3 lemons, quartered, visible seeds removed
2 Vidalia (sweet) onions, peeled and quartered but with root end intact (just rinse off the dirt and trim away the tap roots)
3 lb/1.4 kg small (about the size of ping-pong balls) red-skinned new potatoes, scrubbed but left whole*
21/2 lb/1.2 kg smoked sausage such as andouille or kielbasa, cut on the diagonal into 1-in/2.5-cm pieces
4 mildly hot green chiles such as poblano, Anaheim, Cubanelle, or Hungarian wax, quartered and seeded
10 ears corn, shucked and cut crosswise into 2-in/5-cm chunks
5 to 6 lb/2.3 to 2.7 kg shrimp, preferably jumbo (usually 12 to 16 per 1 lb/455 g), in the shell
Cocktail Sauce (page 37) for serving
Warm French bread and butter for serving
1. TO MAKE THE BROTH: In a large stockpot, combine the broth ingredients, squeezing the juice of the lemons in before you toss in the rinds. Be sure to add the onions and potatoes while the liquid is cold. Bring the pot to a boil. Lower the heat to maintain a simmer.
2. After the broth has simmered for about 20 minutes, test the potatoes for doneness. They should be easily pierced with a knife but not mushy. Using a slotted spoon, spider, or tongs, remove the celery and lemons and discard. Transfer the onions and potatoes to a large colander placed in the sink.
3. Return the broth to a simmer, add the sausage and chiles, and cook for 5 minutes. Add the corn and cook for 5 minutes more. When you’re ready to eat, gather the guests and then drop in the shrimp and cook for 3 minutes. Using the slotted spoon or spider, remove the shrimp as soon as they’re cooked and distribute them equally among serving platters. Scoop out the sausage, chiles, and corn and distribute them among the platters, too.
4. Ladle some of the broth into small dipping bowls for the bread, then pour the remainder into the colander holding the onions and potatoes to rewarm them; drain well. Add the onions and potatoes to the platters. Serve the platters of boil on a table covered in clean newspaper, with the bowls of broth, cocktail sauce, and bread and butter.
TIP
When the shrimp are perfectly cooked, they will become shrimp-pink and float to the surface. That’s when you remove them. Don’t leave them in the broth longer or they will overcook.
* Poor but viable substitute in a pinch: medium russet potatoes, scrubbed and cut into halves or quarters.
