Jim Gossen

Every time Diane Gossen bakes a whole fish, she knows her grandfather is smiling down at her. It was his favorite dish.

When you come from a large Louisiana family, almost anything you cook or bake is bound to remind you of some relative and what he or she loves to eat or cook.

That’s the kind of world Gossen and her husband, Jim – both are from Lafayette – were born into. Both are from big families, and their parents and grandparents were skilled in the kitchen.

“In southeast Louisiana, life was family and cooking,” Diane said.

“It wasn’t about going out to eat; it was the family getting together to eat at home,” Jim added.

“We lived near aunts and uncles and cousins,” Diane said. “We were always surrounded by family and food.”

She still is, especially food. As the wife of a pioneer food purveyor in Houston (Jim Gossen is considered the city’s dean of seafood and one of the state’s most passionate and knowledgeable experts on the bounty of Gulf waters, especially oysters), Diane is, by association, connected to many of the city’s best chefs and top restaurants.

And though they dine out at top restaurants locally and plan their vacations to accommodate restaurant visits, their favorite meals are ones taken at their home in the Larchmont neighborhood near the Galleria. Their kitchen, with its many copper pots and pans, attests to time spent preparing meals and enjoying them.

Diane Gossen is ready to cook a whole 5-pound red snapper, a handsome fish with almost iridescent pink skin and eyes as clear as glass. Meticulous in the kitchen, she has all of the ingredients for the fish and seafood and eggplant stuffing prepped and ready to go. She rose early this day to make two desserts: a syrup cake using a small-batch brand of Louisiana cane syrup and a walnut caramel tart. She’s an accomplished baker with a repertoire of French pastry, tarts, cakes and pies that she excels at. For four years starting in 1989, she baked out of her home in Lafayette and sold to local caterers and private clients. She even considered a full-time baking career.

Fate had other plans. In 2004, she married Jim. They both had been divorced and had families. But having known each other since high school, they had remained friends for years. They joke that Jim wooed her with shrimp and crab, and that’s not a stretch. Jim began selling Gulf seafood out of a pickup in 1972, a business that would turn into Louisiana Foods, a global seafood purveyor that he sold to Sysco three years ago (he remains chairman of the board).

Along the way, he opened restaurants including Willie G’s Seafood & Steaks, Magnolia Bar & Grill and Jimmy G’s Cajun Seafood Restaurant. He’s a founding member of Foodways Texas (Diane is also a member), which works to preserve and promote Texas food culture; serves on the board of the Gulf of Mexico Foundation to promote conservation of the Gulf; and is a member of Southern Foodways Alliance that celebrates the food cultures of the American South.

Food, especially seafood, is never far from the Gossens’ thoughts.

And now the red snapper is ready to come out of the oven. The fish rests on a rich stew redolent of the Cajun and Creole trinity – an elixir that practically runs through the veins of Diane’s French/Acadian ancestry. Her seafood and eggplant stuffing is crisped and bubbling. Her kitchen fills with an intoxicating aroma of garlic, tomatoes and citrus. Her syrup cake and walnut caramel tart wait on a sideboard for dessert.

It all reminds her of her paternal grandmother: “That’s where I get my love of baking. And of vegetables. She always had vegetables from the garden.” And of her maternal grandmother, who loved anything stewed or roux-based, such as seafood stews, crab stew, chicken fricassee, hen stew and gumbo.

“I have a lot to draw on,” Diane said.

She serves up a big hunk of the baked snapper, napping it with the sauce. Somewhere her grandfather is smiling.

Seafood Eggplant Stuffing

Recipes courtesy Diane Gossen

Note: This recipe is doubled so that leftover stuffing can be baked in a casserole. Halve the recipe if you want only the eggplants.

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons grape seed oil

6 ribs celery, chopped

2 large onions, chopped (about 2 cups)

1 large bell pepper, chopped

6-8 cloves garlic, finely chopped

Ground cayenne, to taste

Salt and pepper, to taste

6 large eggplants (two unpeeled to be stuffed; four peeled and cut into ½-inch dice)

2 pounds raw peeled shrimp (large or jumbo, cut in half)

2 tablespoons lemon juice

3-5 shots Worcestershire sauce

1 cup Italian bread crumbs, divided (recipe follows)

¼ cup milk

2 pounds jumbo lump crab

1 stick melted butter

Instructions: Place large sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add olive and grape seed oil and heat. Add celery and cook for two minutes. Add onions and cook for two to three minutes. Add bell pepper and cook for two to three minutes. Add garlic and heat through. Season with cayenne, salt and pepper.

Add peeled, cubed eggplant and cook down about 10 minutes. Reduce heat to medium and add shrimp followed by lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce. Stir to combine for about 3 minutes. Add ½ cup bread crumbs, stir to distribute throughout the mixture then add milk to achieve a creamy texture. Gently stir in crab meat and remove from heat.

Prepare your scooped-out eggplants. Laying lengthwise, cut top and create a pocket by scooping out flesh to accommodate the stuffing. Leave a thick enough wall of eggplant so that it will be sturdy. Rub eggplants with olive oil and place in a glass dish in the microwave for about two minutes or until the eggplants lose their firmness and become pliable enough to stuff.

Fill eggplants with as much stuffing as they can accommodate and mound the top. Sprinkle some of remaining bread crumbs on top and drizzle with some melted butter. Place the remaining stuffing in a buttered casserole dish. Top with remaining bread crumbs and drizzle with remaining butter (add as much butter as you wish). Place in 350-degree oven and bake for 25-30 minutes until the tops of eggplants and casserole are starting to brown and bubble.

Italian Bread Crumbs

2 cups fine bread crumbs

2 ounces freshly grated Parmesan cheese

1 tablespoon dried or fresh oregano

1 tablespoon dried or fresh marjoram

1 tablespoon dried or fresh sweet basil

2 tablespoons dried or fresh chives, finely chopped

2 tablespoons dried or fresh parsley, chopped

Instructions: Mix all ingredients. Store in the refrigerator. Makes about 2 cups.

Baked Whole Red Snapper

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons grape seed oil

3 ribs celery, chopped

3 medium onions, chopped

1 large bell pepper, chopped

1 serrano chile, seeded and diced

1 head garlic cloves, sliced

1 8-ounce can tomato sauce

1 14-ounce can fire-roasted chopped tomatoes

2 large fresh tomatoes, seeded and chopped

1 cup water

4-5 shots of Worcestershire sauce

Salt and black pepper to taste

For the fish

6 celery stalks

1 large orange, sliced into thin wheels

1 5-pound whole red snapper scaled and scored (let fishmonger do this)

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

2 lemons, sliced into thin wheels

Instructions: Place large sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add olive and grape seed oil and heat. Add celery and cook for two minutes. Add onions and cook for two to three minutes.

Add bell pepper and serrano chile and cook two minutes until softened. Add sliced garlic and heat through.

Add tomato sauce and canned chopped tomatoes. Cook for about 4 minutes. Add whole fresh tomatoes, 1 cup water and Worcestershire sauce. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cook for about 10 minutes turning heat to medium.

While tomato mixture is cooking, prepare whole fish. In a large, deep roasting pan, place ribs of celery in bottom and top with sliced oranges. This acts as a base for the fish.

Coat both sides of whole fish with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Place fish on the celery/orange base. Pour tomato mixture all around fish. Top fish with lemon slices.

Cover fish with lid (or foil) and place in 350-degree oven. Fish will take about 45 minutes to cook.

Check fish halfway through and add water to tomato sauce if it is getting too thick (this sauce is basically your gravy for the fish, so you decide how thick you want it). When you can pull the pectoral fin out of the fish with a light tug, it is done. Another test for doneness: Using a fork near the head or thickest part of the flesh to see if the meat is flaky and pulls easily from the bone. Remove fish from oven and let it rest 10 minutes, covered.

Remove fish to a serving platter and decorate with the orange and lemon slices. Remove sauce to a dish for serving with fish. Serve hot with rice.

Gâteau de Sirop (Syrup Cake)

2 cups all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon nutmeg

½ teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon ginger

¼ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup dark brown sugar

1½ cup cane syrup

2 eggs, slightly beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

½ cup boiling water

Instructions: Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Prepare a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with butter and flour. Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl and set aside. In another bowl, whisk syrup, eggs, vanilla and boiling water until smooth. Mix with dry ingredients, beating well.

Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 1 hour.

Dust with powdered sugar or serve with French Custard Sauce.

French Custard Sauce

¹⁄3 cup sugar

1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon cornstarch

¼ teaspoon salt

1 vanilla bean

2 cup whole milk

2 eggs, slightly beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions: Mix all dry ingredients and set aside. Scrape vanilla bean into milk.

Heat until scalded. Strain milk and add to dry ingredients, whisking until smooth.

Cook in a double boiler, stirring occasionally until it thickens then comes to a boil. Then stir constantly for another 2-3 minutes longer. Stir a little of the hot mixture into the eggs to temper. Return egg mixture to the double boiler, stirring constantly until thick, about 5 minutes. Add vanilla. Serve warm.

Walnut Caramel Tart

1 recipe of pâte brisée (short crust pastry)

3½ cups roasted chopped walnuts

2 14-ounce cans caramelized condensed milk (see note that follows)

Instructions: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Roll out ²/3 of the dough. Line a 9-inch fluted tart pan and bake blind for 12 minutes then cool.

Lower oven temperature to 350 degrees. Mix walnuts with the caramel, fill cooled crust. Roll out remaining dough, seal top edges with water, score and brush with beaten eggs. Bake 30-40 minutes until golden brown.

Pâte Brisée

2 cups all-purpose flour

½ cup frozen unsalted butter, cut in 1 tablespoon pieces

¼ teaspoon salt

2 whole eggs

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Instructions: Using a food processor with a metal blade pulse flour, butter and salt, turning on and off rapidly, until butter is cut into flour and very small granules are firmed, about 10 seconds.

Add eggs and lemon juice. Continue processing until ball of dough forms on blades. If dough seems too soft, sprinkle with 1-2 tablespoons flour and process until combined, about 6 seconds. Refrigerate. Makes two 8- or 9-inch shells.

Roasted Walnuts

Instructions: Chop and roast nuts for 8 minutes in oven at 350 degrees. Cool, vacuum pack and store in freezer. Let the required amount come to room temperature before combining with caramel.

Caramel

Instructions: Use your favorite caramel or make one from two cans of sweetened condensed milk.

Note: Though some online recipes call for gently simmering cans in water for 2-3 hours, Borden, maker of Eagle Brand Sweetened Condensed Milk, suggests a stovetop method (pour into top of double boiler and place over boiling water; over low heat simmer for 1 to 1½ hours until it’s a thick caramel color) or microwave method (pour into a glass measuring cup and cook on 50 percent power for 4 minutes, stirring briskly every 2 minutes until smooth; cook on 30 percent power 20 to 26 minutes or until very thick and caramel-colored, stirring briskly every 4 minutes during the first 16 minutes and every 2 minutes for the last 4 to 10 minutes).