I made my own healthier take on jambalaya today. It pretty much followed Paul Prudhomme's recipe but instead of using tasso ham, andouille sausage and chicken thighs, I used chicken breast and very lean ham. After all, it does have to contain ham if it's a jambalaya as the "jamba" part comes from the French jambon or ham. The other ingredient it needs to contain is rice - supposedly the original name for the dish was "jambon ala ya" or ham ala rice (ya is rice in an African dialect). Once again I did my own substitution using 14 multi whole grain rice... that's why it's jambalaya... sorta.
I started with rough chopped Cajun trinity - that's equal parts of onion, celery and bell pepper (it's the Cajun version of the French mirepoix substituting bell pepper for carrot). Since this was my healthy version, I used more veggies than the amount Chef Prudhomme calls for in his recipe.
I also roughly chopped about 3 large tomatoes after peeling and seeding them. To peel just remove the stem core and slice an "X" on the opposite side then dunk in boiling water for a few seconds - you'll literally see the skin start to split. Remove and dunk in ice water to stop the cooking (you want peeled tomatoes, not stewed tomatoes).
First brown the chicken breasts in a little bit of canola oil.
Then add the cubed ham, a couple of bay leaves and about 3 large chopped cloves of fresh garlic. I then add about 2 tablespoons of Paul Prudhomme's Poultry Magic seasoning blend and continue cooking.
Add about 2 & 1/2 cups of chicken broth (I usually use 1 can of lower sodium chicken broth and add water to make 2 & 1/2 cups) and 1/2 cup of tomato sauce along with the multi-grain rice and bring to a boil for about 10 minutes.
I then add the Cajun trinity and chopped tomatoes and cover under a light boil for another 20 minutes - check after about 15 mnutes to make sure there is enough liquid (if too liquid then simmer uncovered).
Remove bay leaves then serve with a nice green salad and toasted multi whole grain bread. Since this dish does have some heat, I usually enjoy a cold beer since the additional alcohol in wine can magnify the burn though an old world Rhone blend would work. Le Bon Ton Roule!
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