When you’ve been trying to follow the paleo diet for as long as I have, you come up with creative ways to modify traditionally non-paleo dishes. I LOVE jambalaya, but an important component of the dish is rice. Recently, I’ve been reading a lot of recipes that substitute cauliflower for rice, so I thought I’d give it a try. While the cauliflower rice isn’t an exact replacement for white rice, it does add some substance to the dish and I’d definitely do it again.

The soup portion of this recipe rocks. It’s not too spicy, not too mild, and is packed with wonderful savory spices. I especially love the complementing flavors and textures of the andouille sausage, shrimp, and chicken. Next time, I’ll add more chicken and possibly blacken it with some cajun spices before throwing it in. Another bonus: this is a crock pot meal, so it’s super easy. Just throw everything in the crock pot and wait.

Ingredients

• 5 cups organic vegetable stock
• 4 bell peppers, chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 large can diced tomatoes (leave the juice)
• 2 cloves garlic, diced
• 1 lb large shrimp, raw and de-veined.
• 4 oz. chicken, diced
• 1 pkg spicy Andouille sausage
• 1 head of cauliflower
• 3 tbsp Cajun Seasoning
• 1/4 cup Louisiana Hot Sauce

Preparation

Place the chopped peppers, onions, garlic, chicken, cajun seasoning and hot sauce in the crockpot with the vegetable stock. Set on low for 6 hours. 30 minutes before it’s finished, toss in the cut up sausages. Pulse raw cauliflower in the food processor until it resembles rice. For the last 20 minutes, add the raw shrimp. Just before serving, steam the cauliflower in the microwave. Serve Jambalaya over steamed cauliflower rice and enjoy.