patti

MUST. HAVE. NOW.

I hadn't really paid attention to whose post I was reading, but when I got to this paragraph, I had a feeling it had to have been written by racheld. I love the way you choose to put your words together! And you pick some purty good'uns. Great writing, as usual.

Boudin is a tasty, portable little snack all on its own. What's not to love about pork and spices and rice all mixed up in a handy casing? A link of boudin is a thing of beauty. To gild it, I take a generous portion of crusty french bread, split it open, and slather both sides with butter. Next, split the boudin casing open and spread the boudin on both sides of the buttered bread. Cover one side with the other, et voila! Boudin poboy. Hmm, now I wonder why I've never considered a fried boudin ball sandwich.

To that baked potato I'd also add grated sharp cheddar and chives, or I'd eliminate the sour cream and use crumbled feta. My son likes to combine real bacon bits with fake bacon bits, along with butter and grated cheese. He doesn't see the fake ones as a substitute, but as an additional crispy flavor of its own. Oh, and bread pudding topped with both homemade whipped cream AND chocolate sauce. And maybe pecans, if they weren't in the bread pudding.

When I was a child, our family of six used to go to 6:00 a.m. Mass a couple of times a week during Lent. Often we'd go out to breakfast afterwards, to a little place called Courthouse Cafe. Sometimes Daddy would only allow us to order a small breakfast of biscuits and jam with juice, other times, we could have a full breakfast. What I remember most fondly, other than the six of us sitting together at the restaurant, was the richness of the thick chocolate milk, the grits, slow-cooked, buttery, and sublime. A bite of grits, a bite of toast, chased with that delicious chocolate milk ... mmmmm. You'd think I'd be waxing nostalgic about the eggs and crispy bacon. Oh, those were good, too. But the other three tastes, those are the ones I remember best. Another food memory is my first taste of raw oysters. Daddy brought home a sackful, and we all sat in the garage as he shucked them. We each waited our turn, one by one. I was a little nervous about it at first, so Daddy gave me a little sleeve of saltines. A fat, fresh oyster, a saltine, and a dash of Tabasco. Great stuff!

I completely agree. My sandwiches most often have mayo on one slice and mustard on the other. No dry slices!

Why would anybody stop at one that DIDN'T?

At first, I misread "peering" as "peeing"!

Excellent work, patti. Yep, a flying squirrel. You can find some more information about them here. Did you recognize it from having seen one before? Or, like me, did you figure it out from its appearance? We still have no idea how it got in the house, of course. ← It had a squirrel face to it, and I thought maybe you quanitified that it wasn't a "tree" squirrel as a clue. I googled flying squirrel and that seemed to be a match. No experience with them, and I hope my first experience won't be in my bedroom during the night!

Nope, not a tree squirrel or a chipmunk, or even a rat. These animals are reportedly very common, but rarely seen. ← Flying squirrel?

I'd be one of the garblers. Merriam-Webster online shows two pronunciations. Goo-da for the cheese and how-da (with aspirated 'h') for the place. http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/aud...da001.wav=Gouda http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/aud...oud01.wav=Gouda

I finally saw the commercial for these today. The bowl looks pretty bad, and I tend to like mixing things up on my plate. If they're truly going for those who like a plate lunch, then why not make it a plate lunch instead of a bowl of gloppy carbs?

Looks like the Jardin du Palais-Royal - so is it Le Grand Véfour? ← That was my guess (which I didn't post), but I must confess that I only thought it might be Paris because of the most recent episode of the Sopranos. In a dream sequence, Carmela left a restaurant and the place she was walking (and saw the late Adrianna) looks just like Therese's photo. Then I did a few searches to find out what restaurant it might be, and came up with Le Grand Véfour, which borders Palais Royal. Still don't know if we're right, though.

Is it in Paris?

Try a ginger dressing on your spinach and strawberry salad. Delicious!

First, I'm from Louisiana and I always say mayonnaise (and kwa sohn, for that matter). Second, Emeril isn't from Louisiana, and although he might be preserving his culture, it isn't Cajun or Yat or Creole, or any of the other diverse New Orleans cultures (NTTAWW his own culture). Having said that, there are plenty of regional pronunciations that are worth a smile or two. Cajun and New Orleans accents are completely different from each other, each interesting in their own right.

Ack! I hate that, too. I see "old fashion" and "ice tea" so often that I'd decided maybe it's just me who thinks it should be "old fashioned" and "iced tea". I thought I'd seen the worst when I saw "stuff shrimp" on a menu. That is, until I saw "stuff shrimps" on another!

The only one on your list I haven't seen is Dinner Rush. I agree with Babette's Feast, Tampopo, Eat Drink Man Woman (my personal favorite) and Big Night. What I think you're missing is Like Water for Chocolate. Fascinating blog, btw.

I talked to an Atchafalya basin crawfisherman today, and he said the water in the basin is just too low to have a good catch, about fifteen feet lower than usual, as a matter of fact. He didn't think walking his boat through muck would be a good thing. That doesn't explain why the pond crawfish aren't being fished very much, though. I'll talk to a pond fisherman on Friday and see what he has to say.

Kathy, the jambalaya looks delicious! And you can't go wrong using a Mayhaw Man recipe as your guideline. Jambalaya is one of those dishes that can withstand lots of recipe fiddling and still be a successful dish. Were the boys interested in having some?

How about a take on jambalaya using your cubed ham, Chinese sausage, and basmati rice? You can use up some of your canned tomatoes in this dish, too. I've never had Chinese sausage, so I'm not quite sure about its use in this dish. What do you think?

are you sure those are Louisiana crawfish and not Chinese? Those are cheap here too, but I don't buy them on principle. I'll live on shrimp this Lenten season until the prices come down. ← I don't buy them, either, but I was tempted when I saw one pound packages of Louisiana crawfish tails for $18.99 at Albertsons! I decided to use Gulf shrimp from my freezer, instead. I've had boiled crawfish three times this season, but luckily for me, they were comped. The ones I had this past Friday were the perfect size, and really tasty.

The battle between Besh and Batali was good. The secret ingredient - andouille! Man, some of those dishes looked great.

It looks great, kangarool! You really do "rool". Please let us know how the gumbo turns out. Having lived in gumbo (and andouille) country all of my life, I sometimes wonder how much effort and trouble I'd go to in order to get the ingredients that Cajun foods require. I'm always impressed by those who go the extra mile.

Our town has Pelicans on Parade, so they're not really food related. Most of them are forgettable, but there's an Elvis pelican in a retro 50s diner that is pretty damn cute. Edited to add: Here's one I've never seen before: Crawfish Pelican