Recipes:
• Boiled Shrimp With Timmy's Shrimp Sauce
• Timmy's Shrimp Sauce
• White Beans and Rice
• Bayou Fried Shrimp
• Shrimp and Sausage Stew
Go behind the scenes with Executive Food Editor, Scott Jones' Blog Post: Cooking with my buddy Timmy
This is a perfect morning for a drag," says Timmy Cheramie as he quickly unravels vibrant green nets into the water near Golden Meadow, Louisiana. A cool Gulf breeze and overcast skies create the ideal setting for capturing this region's prized commodity. About 45 minutes later, shrimp jump and pop as if in electrified water as Timmy hauls in the huge nets by hand. He brims with excitement the way most folks anticipate the opening kick-off of the Super Bowl. Surveying his impressive take (to be used later in the day for a down-home Cajun feast), he turns to me with a huge smile and says, "It's in my blood, bro."
This third-generation shrimper handcrafts outrigging for his boat, sews his own trawling nets, and navigates this bayou's intricate estuaries from memory. But it is Timmy's knack for cooking that motivates his family to fire up the boats and head for their fish camp in the heart of Bayou Lafourche in anticipation of unbeatable food and fun.
"I learned how to cook as a kid on my stepfather's shrimpboat. It was a rite of passage," says Timmy. There were no recipes or cookbooks and, according to him, everything was done by eye. "My stepfather would be out on deck trawling and yelling down to the galley how things should be chopped and cooked. I took to it pretty fast, and it's something I've always enjoyed." Asked what attracts him most to cooking, Timmy responds without missing a beat, "I love to see people's faces light up. I know my food makes them feel good." We think you'll agree that his recipes are Cajun comfort food at its best.
