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Pour some in a glass, add ice cubes & water to taste, drink while imagining you're sitting on a terrace overlooking the caldera in Santorini! Ouzo's great as an aperitif.

We recently came back from two weeks on Seabrook Island. The best restaurant close to both Kiawah & Seabrook is the Rosebank Farm Cafe in the Bohicket Marina. They emphasize locally grown produce & updated Low Country classic dishes. We've been going to Seabrook Island for a number of years now & the quality of Rosebank Farm Cafe hasn't dropped at all. We also liked the Fat Hen. The restaurants at Freshfields Village are pretty much standard American fare, nothing special. And there's a great farmer's market just past the round-about to Kiawah & Seabrook, toward Charleston - Rosebank Farm Market.

We got last-minute reservations at Bukhara in February, through a friend who pulled some strings. We were both very disappointed in the food and service (and prices as well). My pomfret (can't remember now exactly how it was cooked) was overcooked & underseasoned & my husband's meat platter was just undistinguished. The food wasn't bad, but after all the hype, it was a great disappointment.

I have both of his cookbooks & have tried around 10 recipes in all from both. Some of them require a bit of time, but we've been very happy with the results. They definitely do work.

I've bought white porcelain from both Target & Crate & Barrel at much lower prices than Bernardaud charges. I especially like the Crate & Barrel porcelain. They have different sizes & shapes of bowls, including "bistro coupes" (I think that's what theyre called), large shallow bowls.

Kirkland Tuscan EVOO, Starbucks French roast coffee, crab, shrimp, lamb, mussels at the seafood road show, basmati rice, spinach, chanterelle mushrooms, chickens ($0.69/lb) for broth, ribs, flank steak, brisket, cookbooks (from time to time), cokes, yogurt for husband's lunches, cottage cheese, milk, butter, oranges (for fresh juice), limes, lemons, grape tomatoes, wine, port, cheese - the selection's getting better & better, all those wonderful surprises that you happen upon in roaming the aisles!

Try crate & barrel (www.crateandbarrel.com) - they have a nice line of white porcelain dishes - rimmed bowls, square & rectangular plates, &c. I use the oversized rimmed bowls very frequently. They're also reasonably priced.

I've noticed that some of the loaves in the pictures have the tops slashed. I haven't been doing this, although I always do with my "traditional" bread recipes. With this particular wet dough, when do you slash? It seems that the dough is just too wet to slash it when it goes in the pot. And does it make a difference? I've had pretty good results without slashing, but they would probably be better with slashing.

12 more over the holidays, probably more to come - it's an obsession.

I just bought some San Daniele at my WF in Springfield VA four days ago. The only time I haven't been able to get any there is when they'd run out & were waiting for a delivery. How in the world could WF not consider Italian prosciutto to not be up to their standards? BTW - I haven't seen any advertising for La Quercia in a couple of weeks.

I'm not sure if they still do, but they used to be in June & December. They were not advertised - we would call the company & ask when they'd be held. It's certainly worth trying to find out because the prices were at least 50% less than list & sometimes even more. The quality control level was so high that even a small defect could throw a pot into the sale bin.

I have the LTD, 4 saucepans, 4 frying pans, 2 saute pans, including a very large one that I use only occasionally (All-Clad has two annual sales at its factory in PA - that's why I have so much). The heat distribution is very even & the pans are not unduly heavy. In general, I'm very pleased with the pans, but if I had it to do over again, I'm not sure I'd pay extra for the LTD as opposed to the stainless. Especially for the frying pans, if anything spills over while you're cooking, it's stuck on there forever, so all of my frying pans have spotted exteriors. Otherwise All-Clad lives up to its reputation beautifully & is worth the higher cost. I just wish I'd bought mine years ago (I've actually had it about 10 years now).

I make my own yogurt using Fage as the starter. It's not as good as Fage, but is better than other commercial yogurts. I think the difference is that mine is made with cow's milk, while Fage is made with a combination of sheep's & goat's milk, which is much tangier. Mine comes close, though, especially when I remember to drain it!

Does pizza on the grill really taste that much better than pizza in the oven to warrant the extra effort? I've never tried it, as I couldn't see how it would be that much better. Tell me why it's so much better, convince me!

Mix with yogurt, like the Greeks do (sublime), or put on top of good vanilla ice cream.

The way I eat and to have a meal reputed to be better than Besh, I would need to get a cab...and graciously spend the 100. ← You know, it's funny. I wouldn't say that it was better than August, it's entirely in a different kind of league-not skill wise as they are all up on their chops in the extreme, but in thought and attitude. Both places are awesome. They are making food, as is John, that they consider to be really interesting and happily, and they hope that others do to. Even if others were not interested, they would likely be making it anyway, somewhere. The place is, truly, an experience and one that you aren't likely to forget soon. It's a Louisiana restaurant, run by natives, but they are doing things on another plane and I hope that they keep doing it for a very long time. I love the place-if that's not clear already . ← We will be in NO for Jazz Fest, from 28 April to 8 May. Since a business trip to Bay St Louis is in the offing at some point, I haven't made many reservations yet & need to know exactly how necessary reservations are. We're mainly thinking in terms of lunches. Would appreciate any advice you might have. Also are reservations required for lunch at Longbranch? Thanks in advance.

Ask your daughter about the Scorpion Bowl at the Hong Kong! That's I place I plan on returning to this next trip out. ← She admitted to quaffing a few but most remembers the place for the salsa nights (??) ...

Please do. Have them give me a call, I love to meet fellow architects who are also into food. The lamb prosciutto is every bit as good as it sounds! I'm sure you can find Salumi meats somewhere in Boston. They do a wholesale business all over the country. I can find out which restaurants they sell to if you'd like. I'm going to Boston to sit on some architecture juries in May. They are going to take me out to dinner pretty much anywhere I want after. I suggested Oleana. Thoughts? Suggestions? ← I'm thoroughly enjoying your very thoughtful & highly interesting blog. Thanks for all your effort! Oleana is one of our favorite restaurants in Boston. My daughter was in grad school at Harvard & whenever we visited her, we went to Oleana, including the day she graduated! Ana Sortun is very innovative & we highly recommend Oleana.

I just wash mine with soap & warm water & scrub off burnt-on gunk with a sponge/scrubber. They are discolored, but I haven't had any problems with odors or smoking. The instructions for mine warn against using them when wet or moist, so I let them dry thoroughly before using them again. I've had this set for several years now & haven't had any problems.

Where are they sold in the DC metro area?

I just made lamb shanks braised in port with star anise from the March Bon Appetit. Really good. Have also used it in sauces over the years & best of all, just finished a glass of 30-year-old port.

Congratulations & good luck to all of you! I started smoking during rush week my sophmore year in college - mainly to have something to do with my hands - & it stuck. Stopped on 25 December 1986 at 1.26 p.m. after lunch outside at a beach resort south of Madras, India - my last cigarette was smoked with husband & daughter preaching about the nasty habit. I chose India & the vacation because 1) it was away from my routine & 2) Indian cigarettes at the time were really nasty tasting. I had brief relapses & still occasionally smoke a really good cigar but don't regret stopping for one minute. I think the addiction is definitely psychological & has to do with oral gratification & having something to do with the hands. Keep up the good fight & don't worry too much about temporary relapses. It'll get easier every day & you'll really enjoy not being slaves to cigarettes, shucking that nasty smoke odor that permeates everything, not to mention being able to walk long distances without gasping...

I recently bought my third yogurt maker, a Donvier that chimes when the time's up. It makes very good yogurt using Fage as starter & 2% milk. Bought this machine because I would always forget when the yogurt was ready. I've been very pleased with the results as I prefer a tart yogurt & you can control the tartness by how long you process the milk. It's also much cheaper than buying yogurt ready-made.

I've had the grinder & sausage-making attachment for some years now (although I haven't made sausage in a long time). It works pretty well & isn't terribly difficult to clean.

I squeeze fresh juice every day (have gone through about 20 juicers, both cheap & expensive, over the past 30-odd years), have done so for years, so Tropicana - the few times I've had it - seems very artificial to me, not terrible, but not really orange juice! I don't worry too much about pesticides migrating through the orange skins - even though I grow many of my own vegetables & generally try to buy organic when possible (i.e., when not wizened & costing the earth), I've probably already ingested so much bad stuff in the past that I just can't worry too much. I don't think there's anything that can take the place of fresh OJ - a real morning upper.