- [Narrator] This is a production of PBS Charlotte.

- [Announcer] The following episode of, "Charlotte Cooks" is brought to you by Central Piedmont Community College and viewers like you.

Thank you.

- Coming up on the next episode of, "Charlotte Cooks", we're making some blackened trout and some delicious okra gumbo.

(upbeat music) Welcome to this edition of, "Charlotte Cooks".

I'm Chef Pamela Roberts and joining me here in our Charlotte Cook's kitchen today is Chef Chris Coleman.

Hi Chris, how you doing?

- I'm great.

How are you?

- You are here from the Goodyear House and your new venture- - Old Town Kitchen and Cocktails in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

- Oh, that sounds great.

- Yeah.

- I mean, you told me about their menu and it just, I've got to go.

- Yep.

- I just got to go.

So today we have a nice menu from your new venue, which is the Old Town Kitchen and Cocktails.

- There you go.

- And we are going to be making- - [Chris] Blackened trout and shrimp and okra gumbo and Carolina Gold rice.

So this is from the entree menu at Old Town, I'm really excited to be here.

- I'm excited you're here, and I'm excited to hear about all the different things that you're going to show us today.

So the first thing we're going to start off with is making a dark roux.

- [Chris] Right.

- [Pamela] And there's a secret to making a dark roux.

- [Chris] Yeah.

- And that's called?

- Low and slow.

- And patience.

- Lots of patience.

- And lots of patients.

- Lots of patients.

So, a roux is the basis of a gumbo, it gives flavor and it gives body, right?

And you want to get it nice and dark.

But you don't want to rush it, or you'll burn the flour.

So a roux is, just for simplicity, it's equal parts of fat and flour.

So I use a vegetable oil or canola oil, any kind of neutral oil.

You don't want to use an olive oil or something that has a lot of flavor to it.

We're really just trying to bring out the nuttiness in that flour, right?

We've got oil.

We've got flour.

- And this is just regular all purpose four?

- This is just regular all-purpose flour.

And you want to stir these together, get it simmering, get the flour dissolved, and then we're going to turn that heat all the way down to low, as low as it can go.

And again, we want to get a really, really dark roux, almost a brick is what it's called, where it's a little bit past a dark roux, but the flour doesn't burn, right?

And the secret is letting it go really, really low and slow.

The roux that we have for our gumbo, we let go for an hour and and a half.

- So this is the way you start the roux and once you get it all incorporated, you're going to turn that heat down to low, push it on the back burner, and how are you going to tend it?

- So every five to ten minutes, just come by and give it little stir.

- Okay.

- It's helpful to have one of these plastic spatulas or something that you can scrape the bottom with.

Just leave it alone.

Something that we have to tell our cooks all the time at the restaurant is leave the roux alone.

Don't- - Don't turn the heat up.

- Don't turn the heat up.

- Don't rush the process.

- Right, right.

- Yeah, when you rush the process, you end up with burnt roux.

- That's right.

- And not dark roux.

And this, show them what that is.

- [Chris] Sure.

And so this is what we end up with.

- [Pamela] Oh, it looks like chocolate.

- [Chris] Right.

It looks like dark chocolate.

So big difference between- - Yes.

- [Chris] Not even a blonde roux at this point.

And this brick roux.

- And you see, that's not black, that is just a really deep, dark, rich chocolate brown.

- [Chris] Yeah.

- And that's going to be full of flavor.

- Right.

- And that's what you're looking for.

Not burnt roux, not black roux.

And there's a big difference in the aroma, it smells nutty, it smells rich.

- Right.

- And if you have it black, it's going to smell burnt.

- And again, this is going to give the gumbo body, right?

But it more importantly, gives it flavor.

And a good gumbo starts with a good roux.

- Yes.

- You can't rush a roux.

- You can't.

- And then have a good gumbo.

- [Pamela] One of the foundations of Cajun cooking.

- [Chris] One of foundations of Cajun cooking.

The other foundations, the trinity, right?

- Yes.

- So we're going to start cooking our trinity veg in this dark roux.

- So tell everybody what is a trinity, the trinity veg that we know.

- Right.

- But they may not know.

- Yeah.

So trinity veg is bell pepper, celery and onion.

It's very similar to the French mirepoix.

- But no carrots.

- But no carrots, right.

We sub in bell peppers instead of carrots.

And that's the basis of gumbo, etouffee, Creoles, lots of those kind of classic Cajun and Creole dishes have those three ingredients.

So now we have our dark roux hot and we're going to start adding in all of the trinity veg that we just spoke about.

- Okay.

- So we have onion.

- Good.

- Bell pepper.

- Could you use red peppers?

- Or is it traditionally green peppers?

- You could use red, you could use yellow, you could use orange.

- [Pamela] Just not the hot peppers, right?

- [Chris] Just not the hot peppers.

You want the sweet bell peppers.

- Just the sweet peppers.

- So we're going to let this cook down in that dark roux and kind of coat all the veggies.

So I am going to add a little bit of salt, at this point.

Whenever you're sauteing or sweating down vegetables, you add a little bit of salt and that helps to draw out the moisture of the veggies a little bit and help them cook a little bit more evenly and maybe a little quicker.

Next, we'll add in the okra.

And okra is the second most important ingredient.

- Okay.

- In a gumbo, to the roux, right, the roux flavor and body, as we've talked about, okra is also flavor and body.

And the word gumbo comes from a Western African word for okra.

- [Pamela] Yeah.

- That's why it's called gumbo, is because it's got okra in it.

We have some sliced okra here.

- Why don't you show them how the okra looks in its raw state.

- Sure.

- And then show them how you would cut it.

- So this is about a medium okra, right.

like the smaller ones are great for pickles and things.

- Yes, they are.

- Mediums great for stews and frying.

We all love fried okra.

Much longer than this though, and they get really, really woody and kind of too tough.

- Yeah, they really do.

Would you use those in cooking or would you just use those- I like drying them out and shaking them and- - Right.

Maracas, right.

- Yeah.

Right.

(laughing) But would you cook with the ones that are really big?

- I wouldn't personally.

I know some chefs who have tried different experiments with them.

- And were they successful?

- And they were successful.

- Okay.

- So it's something to maybe to look at using the okra seeds as like a couscous or as a grain almost.

But we're just going to slice these pretty thinly.

It's not a chiffonade or anything too classic.

- [Pamela] So it's a basic, just a slice.

- Just a classic chop.

- And you'll find okra in a lot of vegetable soups as well, because it does add a little bit of body to- - Right.

- The broth in a vegetable soup.

- Yeah, I mean, it's very viscous in the middle, right.

There's almost like a, like you squeeze an aloe plant- - Yes.

- And the gel comes out, it's the same with an okra, you squeeze it and that kind of slime comes out.

Which some people- - Don't like.

- Love the slime.

Some people hate it.

- [Pamela] Yeah.

- [Chris] I love the slime, personally.

- [Pamela] A lot of people will say, Oh, okras slimy.

- Right.

- If you put it in gumbos and stews, you don't really notice it that much.

- And the slime actually thickens.

- Yes.

- It's like a natural corn starch.

- That's exactly right.

- Or natural thickener.

So it's kind of thicken whatever soup or stew you're putting it in.

It's a great, great versatile vegetable.

- The nice thing about gumbo is you've got that dark rich roux and because that roux is so dark, it's not going to thicken like a blonde roux would.

And so that okras really going to help add that extra body to that final stew.

It's just, ah, this is going to be so good Chris, I can't believe it.

- So we've added the okra in and you can tell already that slime is working.

- [Pamela] Oh, you can see it.

Yeah.

- [Chris] It has really thickened up.

- Yeah.

- Even the little bit of viscousness, the viscosity that was in here, is already starting to get a little- - [Pamela] And you could see it pulling.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

Ooh, how fun.

- Yeah.

Which is fun, you know?

So at this point, we're going to add in garlic, hot sauce, worcestershire and a little bit of Cajun seasoning.

- And for this, you're using raw garlic?

- Raw garlic.

- Okay.

- That we have minced, about a tablespoons worth.

About three cloves or so.

Cajun seasoning.

Now we get all of our spices from a local company here in town.

I would encourage viewers to go to a local spice shop where they're grinding in house.

- We've got a couple of them here in town, don't we?

- We have a couple in town, they're great.

- [Pamela] I love walking into those stores.

It's like, ah.

- Smells fantastic, right?

- [Pamela] I could just stand there and breathe.

- So we didn't add a ton.

We don't want this to be spicy.

Gumbo shouldn't be spicy, it should be nutty and earthy and deep and rich.

It's kind of a misnomer that gumbo is spicy.

It's really not.

- Even though we're adding hot sauce.

- We're adding some hot sauce.

- It's just there for a little.

- There for, well, hot sauce contains vinegar, right?

- Yeah.

- And vinegar brightens, just like salt does.

- Absolutely everything.

- Worcestershire in here as well.

Worcestershire does the same thing, it kind of brightens and as like a funky depth, right?

Because of the anchovies that's in that worcestershire, gives it some fishiness.

- There are anchovies in worcestershire.

- Right.

And kind of just let these flavors toast for just a minute and develop.

You want the dry spices that are in there, as well as those wet, the worcestershire and the hot sauce to kind of start to develop some flavor.

Gumbo is something that, you know, like today we're going eat it as soon as we make it, with the trout and the rice.

But it's great two, three, four days later.

- Yeah.

- I mean it is great.

- 'Cause the flavor, it's kind of like spaghetti sauce.

- It just develops.

- The flavors just meld and merry.

- It's so good.

- Become a little bit different.

- This is my favorite type of cooking, just low and slow, one pot wonders I call them.

- Okay, good.

- Where you just kind of cook in the same pot and you cook over a couple of hours and pour yourself glass wine, turn on some music.

- There you go.

- Turn a football game on or something and just let it work.

So next we'll add some chicken stock.

You could certainly do this with a seafood stock or a vegetable stock.

It doesn't have to be chicken.

Growing up, my mom actually would use water, which is fine too.

- But we learned, as professional chefs, instead of using water, we want to add something with flavor.

- With a little bit of flavor.

- So we look for vegetable stock, chicken stocks, beef stocks, whatever it is that's appropriate.

And certainly if you wanted to keep this vegan or vegan.

- [Chris] Right.

- [Pamela] You would want to use a vegetable stock.

- [Chris] Right.

- [Pamela] So now you've got all that mixed in, what's the next step?

I bet it's a simmer.

- It's a simmer.

(laughing) So we're going to to bring this to a boil, turn it down to a simmer, put it over to the side and just let it go for 25, 30 minutes or so.

You can actually simmer it a little bit harder and rush it along.

At this point in the process, it's totally fine to do that.

Again, if you're just relaxing, you're just cooking, just let it do a slow simmer for about 25, 30 minutes or so.

- [Pamela] So next we got to work on some rice.

- [Chris] Yeah.

- But you're going to tell us about this rice, aren't you?

- Yeah.

It's some really, really special rice we're cooking today.

So this is Carolina Gold Rice, which is a really, really special ingredient.

This is the first rice that was grown in the Americas.

It came over, it was directly from Western Africa.

And it's an interesting story.

So we got this rice in America because there was a trade ship heading to the Indies, heading West.

And it ship wrecked outside of Charleston.

- Okay.

- So the crew worked to get everything off the ship, before it was lost to sea.

And Carolina Gold rice was one of those things.

Obviously it wasn't called Carolina Gold at the time, but they planted it here and it took off.

There's an ugly history behind some of agriculture and farming and the Americas, but we have to talk about it, we have to recognize it.

Slaves were cheap labor, but they were super smart.

I mean, they brought the knowledge of growing this rice and a lot of other ingredients with them to America.

So, obviously they were exploited for it, but we kind of honor their knowledge and their heritage with this rice.

They saw the mucky swamp lands.

- And they knew they could grow it.

- And they knew they could grow it.

- Yeah.

- So they planted it and it kind of slowly mutated over a couple of generations into what we know now as Carolina Gold Rice, which really was lost to farming after the Emancipation Proclamation.

- Right.

And the slaves weren't there to grow it anymore.

- Exactly.

- Yeah.

- And people said, "Well, this rice doesn't produce as much.

it cost a lot more to plant.

And we just want something that grows fast and quick".

So that's where the commodity rice has come in, right.

Glenn Roberts, David Shields, a lot of people in South Carolina said, "Well, this rice has been lost forever".

And so they found seeds and they replanted it.

And so now Carolina Gold Rice is on the rebound.

This particular rice came from a North Carolina farm and mill, which is the first farm to grow Carolina Gold Rice in North Carolina since 1900.

So that, to me, this is history.

- Yeah.

It is.

- Whenever I cook with this, I'm cooking with history.

- [Pamela] It it is history.

It is absolutely history.

- This rice has a super high starch content and you can cook it however you want to.

It's a short grain rice.

You can cook it like a risotto, you can cook it like a pilaf.

Today we're going to cook it with the Charleston snow method, which is something that I learned from reading books by guys like Sean Brock.

And it's a really interesting method because you cook it in a lot of water.

- So we're not worried about ratios here?

- We're not worried about ratios here.

- Okay.

- We're cooking this like pasta.

I've got just some boiling water, no salt.

We're going to add a couple bay leaves.

And then I'm going to dump in the rice here.

We've got about a cup or so of this Carolina Gold.

We're going to let this rice go for about eight to ten minutes.

We'll start checking it at eight minutes or so, make sure that it's done.

You want an Al Dente rice, it's almost like cooking pasta, where you want a little bit of that to the tooth.

And then we'll strain it out.

We'll get it onto a sheet tray and get it in the fridge to cool it down.

It's a really interesting method.

- It is.

And you call it the Carolina Snow?

- The Charleston snow method.

- Like snow, as in snow?

- Like snow, as in snow.

- Oh, how wonderful.

- Yeah.

- [Pamela] And so one of the big differences here, that I'm witnessing is, you're not looking at two to one for rice and water.

- Right.

- And we're not looking at 20 minutes.

- Right.

- We're cooking- - Fast and hard.

- In a lot of water and fast.

You're boiling, - Right.

- You're not turning it down to simmer.

You're not covering it.

- Right.

Nope.

- And then we're going to cook it for eight to ten minutes.

- Yep.

- Strain it and then cool it.

then reheat it in the oven- - Cool it and we'll reheat it in the oven.

- And then it's going to be done.

- Yeah.

- Big difference.

Big difference in the way we traditionally have taught and learned how to cook rice.

- [Chris] This type of cooking was really brought out of kind of restaurant cooking, right?

- [Pamela] Yeah.

Well we need to do something quick.

- In restaurants, you got to be able to turn those tables and get that food on the table really quickly, right?

- [Pamela] Yeah, you do.

- This is a meal that, again, great for restaurants, but great for home because you can cook the gumbo ahead of time, you can cook the rice ahead of time.

And when your guests are arriving, when you're sitting down, all you have to do is blacken the fish, rewarm the rice, rewarm the gumbo, and you're good to go.

So, looks like it's ready.

I think we're time to strain.

Okay, so once it's strained, we're going to put it on this sheet tray here and spread it out.

And the idea here is, we're stopping the cooking of the rice at this point by allowing all that steam to come off of the rice.

- Making rice facials here.

- We are getting, we are.

(laughing) Yeah.

It's good for your skin.

It opens up your pores.

So at this point, we're going to put this into our refrigerator and cool it down, stop that cooking and then later on we'll pop it in the oven and warm it up.

Okay, so we've got our gumbo here, it's been simmering now for a little bit.

- [Pamela] You can see it's reduced some, too.

- It has reduced some.

Yep.

We're going to add in some tomato.

Now tomatoes are a little bit of a cheat in gumbo.

It's kind of, we're kind of being a little controversial here.

- Okay, why?

- If you ask someone who is of Cajun descent, if gumbo has tomato in it, they'll say no.

If you ask someone who is of Creole descent if gumbo has tomato in it, they'll say yes.

And the difference is just in the background, so another history lesson, might bore you a minute.

Cajuns are descendant of the Native Americans and European settlers that were in the area.

Creole is from the French Canadian.

- Yes.

- So they used a lot of tomato product in their cooking and a lot of cream and butter and stuff, whereas Cajuns did not.

So, that's kind of the difference between Cajun and Creole.

- Think of the difference, French cuisine versus rustic local cuisine.

- Right.

Right.

I had a chef that worked with us at Old Town for a while, who was of Cajun descent and he hated the fact that we put tomato in our gumbo.

- No.

(laughing) - But I said that's the way that I grew up eating it.

I guess my mom was a bit more of the Creole side of things, but tomato should be in there, in my opinion.

- [Pamela] Yeah.

Okay.

- [Chris] Yeah.

- [Pamela] You bringing it back to a boil?

- [Chris] Right.

- And we're going to add one more ingredient.

- Right.

The shrimp.

And so we are using shrimp here that are about 26, 30.

So these would be large shrimp at your grocery store, or your fish monger, wherever you go.

You can certainly use smaller shrimp for this particular dish.

I wouldn't use larger ones though because when we're plating it up, we want to make sure that everyone has three or four shrimp on their plate.

If they get much bigger than it's a lot of protein.

- It's really not necessary to use the big shrimp in stews and okras.

- It's not, it's not.

- It's just not.

So the smaller ones are good.

- You'll see that the shrimp cook very quickly.

What we're going to actually do is put the shrimp in there, turn the heat off, push the gumbo to the back and let the shrimp just hang out and they'll naturally cook in that kind of carry you over cooking.

- And they won't be overcooked that way.

- [Chris] They won't, they won't.

- [Pamela] Good.

- So we're going to push this to the side and let the shrimp hang out and get started on the blackened trout.

- All right.

I've got a pot here for you.

How's that?

- Yeah, that's great.

- [Pamela] That's a beautiful cast iron pan.

- It really, really is.

You guys are taking care of it here.

- Now if you don't have a cast iron pan, can you still make blackened trout?

- You can.

- Okay.

- And you can certainly do this in a saute pan.

This is not a traditional blackened trout, where it's just so many spices and seasonings that you can't even see the fish.

We're only going to blacken one side of it, 'cause I don't want to burn people's mouths off.

And I like that really crispy skin, so.

- Yeah.

- That's what we're going to work on first, is showing kind of how I use some tricks to crisp up skin.

- Good.

I think that most people at home don't even think about the skin on the fish.

- Yeah, so we're going to work on getting the skin as dry as possible, so we can get a really crispy skin on it.

So we've got some beautiful mountain trout here from North Carolina.

- Those are pretty.

- Now, mountain trout in North Carolina is farm raised, but it's a sustainable way of farming and they grow right in the cool waters, right from our lakes and rivers in the North Carolina mountains.

You can find these year round, which is why I love trout because it is kind of a year round fish.

- [Pamela] You know, the only thing I don't like about trout, all the bones.

- [Chris] That's true.

There are some little bones.

- [Pamela] But I love trout.

- I love trout.

It's something that we have on our menu year round at both of our restaurants.

Goodyear and Old Town.

We're going to salt the skin here, we're going to let it hang out for just a minute or two.

And just like when we talked about putting salt in with vegetables when your sauteing, it brings moisture to the surface, right?

So this salt is going to bring moisture to the surface of the fish.

Then we're going to kind of wipe it off and pat it dry and then we'll salt it again for seasoning purposes.

But right now, we're kind of doing a really, really quick cure.

- Yeah.

- Bringing out the moisture.

- It's just extracting the moisture.

- It's extracting extra moisture.

- So we can get that extra crispy.

- Right.

If you try to put wet fish skin into a pan, it's going to buckle up and it's going to steam instead of fry.

- [Pamela] Yes.

- And then you'll just get soggy fish skin, which is- - Soggy fish skin.

- Disgusting.

- Who wants soggy fish skin?

And I think that's what most people have had- - Right.

- Is soggy fish skin.

- And they don't like it, right.

- And they go, I don't like fish skin.

- So.

- [Pamela] Most of the time, we're thinking about that soggy, slimy stuff that's on the back.

- [Chris] Right.

So we're going to apply a little bit of pressure here.

And then you can take it one step further if you like, which is something that professionals would do.

- [Pamela] Just make sure there's no scale on it?

- [Chris] It's that, it's wiping off some of that extra salt and it's pulling any leftover residual moisture to the surface.

- Oh yeah, there it is.

There you go.

Those are beautiful trout.

- All right, so we got all that excess moisture off.

We'll do a little more salt.

Not much.

- [Pamela] And this is for the seasoning?

- This is just for seasoning, right.

Our pan is smoking, which is a good thing.

We have oil here, we need a little bit of butter, just a tablespoon or so.

- A lot of times people will be worried about having the butter in such a hot pan and burning the butter, but we've added the oil.

- Right.

- So it's going to increase that smoke point a little bit, so you're going to be able to use that butter without it burning on you as quickly.

- Right.

We're going to slowly put these in.

We've got a large pan here, so we can fit all four filets in at once.

As soon as I put it down here, I'm using my fingers to kind of press that skin against- - Could you use a bacon press?

- You could certainly use a bacon press or even a spatula if you wanted to.

- But the key there is to get all of that skin in contact with the bottom of that pan.

- That's correct.

- If you just lay it in there and don't do that, you're going to find that there's pockets of your skin that do not get in contact with that pan.

- [Chris] That's correct.

- And if your pan's not big enough to do all your fish at once, do it in batches.

- Right.

- [Pamela] Keep your pan hot though.

- [Chris] And let it reheat.

Right?

(fish sizzling) This one was a little more wet because it's popping on me.

- There you go.

Yeah.

And look at that, you can actually see the trout starting to cook too.

See it creeping up the edges, yeah.

- And that's honestly when you know it's done, that's what we try to teach our cooks at the restaurants, is that's when you know the trout itself is cooking through, is when you see that color change.

So we like to cook it through, pretty much all the way, skin side down and that way we know we're getting that really extra crispy skin.

So next I've got my blackening seasoning here.

A traditional blackened fish, New Orleans style, (indistinct) style, you'd blacken both sides of it.

- And it's loaded with spice.

- Loaded with spice.

Again, we want people to still be able to taste the trout, but kind of pay homage to that New Orleans style, Paul Prudhomme, Emeril Lagasse, you know, the Commanders Palace.

- Right.

- We're adding just a little bit of this to the flesh side and then when the skin is crisp and the trout is cooked almost all the way through, we're going to turn it over and just kind of kiss this side, 30 seconds in the oil, just to get a- - Sheen from the oil.

- A little bit of char on those spices and let those develop a little bit.

- [Pamela] Looks fantastic.

- The fish itself has turned from that kind of opaque to white around the edges.

- All the way around the edges, Yes.

- Our skin is nice and crisp.

- Oh, how pretty.

How pretty.

- We're going to go 30 seconds on the flesh side down.

(fish sizzling) - Mm, mm, mm.

- You getting excited?

- This is looking awesome.

- [Chris] So I'm going to pull the trout out and then we can get the rice in.

- So how many of these filets are a portion?

- I do one filet per person.

This is a four ounce trout filet.

- [Pamela] And they also have the shrimp in the gumbo.

- They have the shrimp in the gumbo.

- Okay.

- So we're looking at about, six to seven ounces of protein.

- [Pamela] That's all you need.

- [Chris] Per person, which is fine.

- This rice is nice and cool now.

- Right.

- And so we're going to reheat it.

How are we going to reheat it?

- So this is part of that Charleston Snow Method, is where you boil it until it's got a little toothsome still in the middle.

We've cooled it down.

We're going to take a little bit of butter.

We've got our oven at about 350.

- And we're not cooking the rice again?

- We're not cooking it.

- We're just reheating it.

- Reheating it and melting that butter down.

- [Pamela] Right.

We're going to go into the oven.

- And if it's really nice and cold from a refrigerator, it'll take about eight to ten minutes or so in the oven.

- Okay.

- If it's still a little warm, like you didn't really cool it down all the way, three to four minutes is fine.

So this butter has melted.

- Oh look.

Yes.

- I like how it kind of just comes right up.

- Yeah.

So that's it?

- [Chris] Kind of fluffs.

- I love the snow method.

- So what we've done is, right, so what we've done is we have dried out any extra moisture that was in the rice, right?

From cooling it down the way we did and then popping into the oven dries it even more.

So it's fluffy but- - [Pamela] And it's not going to stick together.

- Right.

- It's just all loose and- - And when you eat it, it's kind of, it's creamy in your mouth, that's why they call it the Charleston Snow Method, 'cause it melts on your tongue.

- Nice.

Okay.

- So time to plate.

- Yay.

- We have gumbo.

So we're going to put gumbo down.

Make sure that everyone gets three or four shrimp in there, about six ounces or so.

- [Pamela] And that's why you don't want to use such super huge shrimp in there.

- [Chris] Right.

I got three on the first go on that one, so.

- There you go.

It's your lucky day.

That smells divine.

I love how dark it stayed from that roux.

That's beautiful.

- (indistinct) a little bit of rice now.

- [Pamela] Put the rice in the middle.

- [Chris] Yep.

- Right on top.

And you're going to serve it skin side up, correct?

- We're going to serve it skin side up, so people know it's okay to eat the skin.

- [Pamela] Be adventurous and try the skin.

- And then we have a little bit of chive here, just to garnish.

And this is a simple kind of rustic, homey plate.

There's nothing too too fancy about it, but it's just delicious.

- It's beautiful.

It is absolutely beautiful.

So here you have it, y'all, look at this.

This is our blackened trout with Carolina Gold Rice, you heard about how special it was, and shrimp gumbo.

Let me have that other plate, Chris, let me show them both plates.

- Here we go.

- There we go.

This is amazing.

This is a history in a bowl.

So many different ways.

So if you want to grab these recipes, you can visit our website at pbscharlotte.org or send me an email at Pamela.roberts, P-A-M-E-L-A dot Roberts, R-O-B-E-R-T-S @ cpcc.edu and I will send you a link to all of our recipes that we have on our website.

Thank you for watching this episode of, "Charlotte Cooks" and Chris, thanks for joining us.

- Happy to be here.

- I'm going to have you back again.

- Sounds good.

- Thank you.

And we'll catch you next time on, "Charlotte Cooks".

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] A production of PBS Charlotte.