Gumbo with seafood and rice

This is a fairly hearty soup. Consider this when choosing a second course, if you are not used to dining with one thing. The best continuation is a vegetable salad with a little unrefined oil.

Ingredients

• 500 g raw headless shrimp
• 120g cooked crab meat (optional)
• 200 g long grain rice, better than brown
• 1.5 l vegetable broth or good drinking water
• 400 g chopped tomatoes in their own juice
• 1 large onion
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 2 celery stalks
• 4 sprigs of parsley
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 tsp dry oregano
• 1 tsp dry thyme
• a pinch of ground cayenne pepper
• salt, freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. Soak the rice in cold water for 1 hour, then rinse and boil in plenty of salted boiling water until tender, 25 minutes. Place in a strainer and keep the rice warm.
2. Peel and chop the onion and garlic, cut the celery into thin slices. Disassemble the parsley into leaves and chop finely.
3. Peel the shrimp from the shell, remove the intestinal vein. Remove chitinous plates from crab meat.
4. Mix tomatoes with juice with broth (water). Put on fire and bring to a boil. Add onion, garlic, celery, parsley, bay leaf, oregano, and thyme. Cook for 10 minutes.
5. Add shrimp and crab meat to the soup, season with salt, black pepper and cayenne pepper. Cook for another 10 minutes. Remove from heat, remove bay leaf.
6. Place rice in deep bowls, pour in hot soup, serve immediately.