mshafran

Hmmm, I dragged Sarah over to Famous Ray's (the 10th street location, of course) for my first slice of New York pizza since we arrived from Sydney, and I found it to be merely good, but not great. I found the sauce to be too pasty and lifeless - maybe a bit too much tomato paste? - and the cheese was good enough, but didn't strike me as anything of high quality. I had much better experiences at Arturo's (for the meatball pizza, and only the meatball pizza) and my Hoboken fave, Benny Tudino's, which I consider very good pizzerias but shy of that top bracket. There's obviously better pizza out there, and from my pilgrimages to Pepe's and Sally's from my drives up to my alma mater, UMass Amherst, I've had a similar tale of complete disbelief that New Haven could have better pizza than New York. Your descriptions of them are right on the money.

Hi all. I'm off to Thailand for 2.5 weeks and am looking for an above-average cooking school to hit while I'm there. I'll be going to Bangkok, Chiang Mai and down towards Krabi and Kho Lanta in the south. I'm looking at several, including Time For Lime in Kho Lanta and the Baan Thai Cookery School in Chiang Mai, but don't have much to judge them by. I'm looking for a quality school that can both teach me traditional Thai cooking, but also has a creative approach, so that I'll learn more than just Pad Thai, Tom Yum Goong and the standard green curry. Any recommendations are greatly appreciated. -Michael --- Michael Shafran delicious. magazine Sydney, Australia www.deliciousmagazine.com.au