Missing links: boudin, anyone? In praise of the Cajun foodstuff that doesn't get around.

Of all the things I've eaten in the Cajun parishes of Louisiana -- an array of foodstuffs which has been characterized as somewhere between extensive and deplorable -- I yearn most often for boudin. When people in Breaux Bridge or Opelousas or Jeanerette talk about boudin (pronounced "boo-DAN"), they mean a soft, spicy mixture of rice and pork and liver and seasoning which is squeezed hot into the mouth from a sausage casing, usually in the parking lot of a grocery store and preferably while leaning against a pickup. ("Boudin" means blood sausage to the French, most of whom would probably line up for immigration visas if they ever tasted the Cajun version.) I figure that ...