Live Online

[Malawry]

One of my favorite aspects of Washingtonpost.com has been the Live Online discussions, where staff writers and special guests come respond to questions on set subjects for an hour. Tom Sietsema does a regular Live Online weekly chat, and Kim O'Donnel (who works for washingtonpost.com and is not a Washington Post staff writer) hosts "What's Cooking?," a discussion on cooking issues. In Tom's case, the Live Online chat has clearly directed the way he writes his restaurant column, and he even based his last Dining Guide on a Live Online type format (Where do I take the kids? *bam*, here's three good choices with a short review each.)

There was a weekly cookbook author chat for a while. Was the Food section involved in this at all? Any idea why it folded?

Does the Post Food section intend to get more involved in Live Online? Why or why not?

[Jeanne McManus]

We did for a while, when the online chats first started, but we were asked to speak on specific topics each week, i.e., baking cakes, softshell crabs, and after about 10 minutes it seemed like all we were saying was huminnna hummmina, you know?

But this brings up a good point, and one I liked to hear more about from you. How many of you use online sources for recipes? During our chats we would often have people sending in recipes. I'm a stickler for never running a recipe that hasn't been tested and it just made me extremely wary to look as if, in any way, I was endorsing or approving a recipe that had been sent to our chat, when I wasn't sure it would work.

The only place I really head online is epicurious.com. What about the rest of you?