Louisiana is the home of many excellent things; delicious foods, our good friend Jeff, and the inventor of these exquisite Cajun Crab Cakes with Jalapeno Remoulade.  Whenever we travel to a coastal area, Paul starts researching regional takes on crab cakes, a particular favorite of his.   Our time in New Orleans last year was a definite button busting success of a food vacation, with one exception, Paul did not find the one perfect crab cake.  We returned home and proceeded to immerse ourselves (read: obsess) with Cajun and Creole cooking,  It was through a Louisiana native chef and cookbook author, Donald Link, that we found this dynamic crab cake recipe.  Cajun Crab Cakes with Jalapeno Remoulade feature some of the classic Cajun flavors with an incredible punchy hit of flavor.  These crab cakes are unique in their minimal use of filler and binding ingredients, making for a very loose cake and which allows the sweetness of the crab to shine.  These crab cakes do rely heavily on the quality of your crab meat, so make sure to get the best quality you can find.   

Following a weekend of holiday feasting, we usually find ourselves craving something light, and refreshing.  After we had stuffed ourselves to capacity,  these Crab Lettuce Wraps with Spicy Lime Vinaigrette were the refreshing light meal to bring us back from a carb induced holiday daze. While crab is a splurge, this dish allows the sweet and delicate flavor of blue crab to shine. It is worth every penny. If you're truly adventurous, you can buy crab fresh, cook it and remove the meat.  We generally buy a high quality canned crab, which is quick, easy and consistently available. To make these crab wraps, Rebecca used avocado, some stunning watermelon radishes, cucumber, and a sweet and spicy lime vinaigrette. She used hydroponic Bibb lettuce fresh from our CSA for the wraps.   We found these cute little lettuce cups were a neat way of holding this light and healthy crab salad together.