The Fuzzy Chef & Friends

Cajuns make a type of fried rice they call "Dirty Rice".  It consists of cooked rice, fried with chicken gizzards & livers, sausage, peppers, onions and spices.  Since I avoid meat, I developed a version which uses no meat products and, while not authentic, is still quite tasty.  We call it "PG-13 Rice" since it's not quite "dirty".

Click through for recipe.

I don't much like turkey, and neither do my in-laws.  So for the last several years we've been doing something else entirely for American Thanksgiving ... and because I do most of the cooking, without meat.   Usually I do something around a specific ethnic theme.  Past Thanksgivings have included: Turkish food, Austrian food, and Cioppino. 

This year, it was time for Cajun/Creole.  Accordingly we requested every New Orleans cookbook available at the San Francisco Public Library, and I went browsing for recipes.  I'll have cookbook reviews later; in the meantime, click through for pictures.

Since we live in San Francisco, we keep a sourdough starter. Here, it's very easy to get one started and even easier to keep it going ... we just have to make something with it every 3 weeks. I'm not going to explain the care and feeding of a sourdough starter now, but I will give you a basic sourdough bread recipe. I will give you a bread recipe, though ... (continued)