{"id":1585,"date":"2017-09-21T13:28:12","date_gmt":"2017-09-21T13:28:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thewanderingrumpus.com\/\/?p=1585"},"modified":"2017-09-21T13:28:12","modified_gmt":"2017-09-21T13:28:12","slug":"cooking-through-cultures-roasted-okra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thewanderingrumpus.com\/index.php\/2017\/09\/21\/cooking-through-cultures-roasted-okra\/","title":{"rendered":"Cooking Through Cultures: Roasted Okra"},"content":{"rendered":"

I grew up in the south and my mom is from southern Louisiana so I ate a lot of okra as a child. We had fried okra, okra in gumbo and soup, pickled okra, saut\u00e9ed okra – we grew okra in our garden a few times so I even ate it raw. When cooked, okra becomes a great thickener – it gets stringy and sticky which was mesmerizing to me as a child.<\/span><\/p>\n

The history of okra<\/a> is pretty fascinating too – okra came to the the U.S. in the 1700s by slaves from West Africa. In Louisiana, the Cr\u00e9oles learned from slaves the use of okra to thicken soups and it is now an essential in Cr\u00e9ole Gumbo which my mom cooks regularly. In some areas of the world okra is actually called gumbo – which we know as a soup that also originated in West Africa.<\/span><\/p>\n

These days, my favorite way to cook and eat okra is also the easiest – I simply roast it at a high temperature with salt, pepper and olive oil. That\u2019s it! My family will eat okra by the dozens this way – even my pickiest eater<\/a>! During late summer, we eat roasted okra at least once a week. And if we\u2019re not growing it, it\u2019s super cheap in our local grocery store.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Here\u2019s our simple roasted okra recipe:<\/span><\/p>\n