I made myself a pot this weekend from scratch... chicken, sausage, and okra. I still eating it for lunch this week at work.

Skim off some of that fat on top Slo!

Ok, bacon in a gumbo??? That's just weird!
But, I can't badmouth anyone for loving bacon... there's just something magical about pork fat!

Had some leftover shrimp and sausage gumbo last night for dinner. Man, that was good!

I've actually done it before... but after rendering it down, the bacon itself was just so soggy and I didn't find it to have much flavor left. If I ever do it again, I'll crisp it up, break it up, and use it as a crunchy garnish on top.

... well, there's a method to my madness ... I did it because I was using a slow cooker and I didn't really have any oil laying around for a roux and I'm really not familiar with using a roux, so I diced up a half pound of bacon, fried it, kept some of the grease for the roux and kinda' cooked the celery/onions/garlic/bell pepper until soft in the rest of the grease before putting it all in the cooker.

A little unconventional, I know, but I am about 1300 miles north of true 'gumbo country' and I was unsupervised, .

That actually sounds good, though I have never had bacon in gumbo before. Bacon makes most everything taste better.

A po'boy sounds good ... do you guys ever put coleslaw on a sandwich around there? A good slaw really dresses it up, IMO, but maybe it's an up-north thing.