Sausage & Shrimp Jambalaya
Most attribute the French heritage of the Louisiana bayou people to coining the name for this dish. The enslaved Africans living in of the area used the word “ya” for rice and the Cajun French speakers eventually adopted this word for wild rice. Combining the phrase ham with rice in their dialect resulted in the phrase “jambon à la ya”.
I had a chance to take in a cooking class given by a New Orleans chef who explained the secrets of making a good Jambalaya. Her mantra helped me to memorize this recipe: “remember the Holy Trinity”.
- The trinity of vegetables: onions, bell peppers and celery
- The trinity of herbs: oregano, thyme and bay leaf
- The trinity of spices: red pepper (cayenne), black pepper, and white pepper


- 3 large hot sausages
- 1 large yellow onion, diced
- 1 rib of celery, diced
- 1 green or red bell pepper, diced
- 1 quart, stewed tomatoes
- 1 cup converted long grain rice
- 1 cup chicken stock
- 1 cup water
- 1 cup tomato juice
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1 tsp thyme
- 3 bay leaves
- ½ tsp cayenne pepper
- ½ tsp fresh ground black pepper
- ½ tsp white pepper
- ½ tsp salt
- 12 medium shrimps, raw, peeled
- Remove the casing from the sausage and chop into bite size pieces. Cook the sausage in a large deep pan or wok on medium heat until the pink has gone.
- Remove the sausage and most of the grease from the pan, saving about 1 tbsp.
- Add the vegetables to the pan and cook on medium heat until tender. Return the sausage back to the pan for the last couple of minutes.
- Stir in the tomatoes and seasonings and bring to a simmer.
- Stir in the rice, water, broth and tomato juice and allow to simmer covered for about 25 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Before serving, bury the shrimp below the surface with the pot still simmering. Cook covered for about 5 more minutes or until the shrimp turns pink.
- You can make your own variations by changing the meat. Chicken is commonly used along with other seafood like crawfish or oysters.