I love fish but I don't buy it to cook at home very often, mainly because I don't really know how to pick the freshest one out. CeCe Sullivan over at The Seattle Times interviewed a few experts and wrote a starter guide to picking fresh fish out and also what to do once you've gotten them home: "Once home, "all fish, whether fillets and steaks or whole fish, should be unwrapped and released from their packaging," said Dale Erickson, owner of University Seafood and Poultry Co. in the University District. "The foul air that collects can produce bacteria quickly." He suggests covering the fish with a wet tea towel or loose piece of plastic wrap, refrigerating it, and eating... More

Chocolate bars at Pierre Marcolini, a chocolatier from Belgium. I first had his chocolates at his shop in Paris. I always lean toward more bittersweet, not more than 70%, not waxy, i love the variety of beans that he uses. Eating and drinking at the food bar at Bella Vitae: I love the fried lamb meatballs, puntarelle in season, radicchio wrapped in pancetta. I love the mussels at Bar Jamon and the octopus. I especially love them when I can get one of the 12 seats in the joint.... More

In a move I wholeheartedly approve Boston Magazine sent writer Erin Byers to eat 20 lobster rolls in three weeks. I can do the math. That's just about a lobster roll a day. The winners: B&G Oysters 550 Tremont St., 617-423-0550. She calls it the "world's most perfect lobster roll." It's 8 ounces of lobster meat with a lemon-garlic mayo, chive and celery. Neptune Oyster 63 Salem St., 617-742-3474. This is Byers' warm lobster roll of choice. She describes it as "warm butter-basted claw and tail meat with drawn butter and butter-soaked brioche." I sense a butter theme present in this particular sandwich.... More

I am as big a champion of sustainable agriculture and responsibly, ethically raised meat as most, but I have to say I'm baffled by Whole Foods' recent decision not to sell live lobsters and crabs in their stores because these crustaceans suffer unnecessarily in captivity and subsequent death. I'm sure lobsters and crabs don't look forward to being put in tanks, killed and eaten, but if we can't eat lobsters and crabs with impunity, what's next? Whole Foods banning the sale of Bumble Bee (or even a fabulous fancy-pants brand like Ortiz) tuna because the tuna suffer horribly on their way to the can? Talk about slippery slope.... More

Having just come from a thoroughly disappointing meat at NY's latest attempt at a clam shack, Ditch Plains, I began to ruminate on how much I love fried clams. With Memorial Day, the official start of the fried clam eating season, just around the corner, here is my absolutely incomplete guide to eating fried clams in the NYC area, Connecticut, and Massachusetts, with a southern Maine spot thrown in for good measure. The descriptions of the clams themselves will be minimal. As I discovered a couple of years ago when I went on a ten clamshack eating adventure with Dave Pastnernack, the chef of Esca, fried clams are either really good (sweet, nutty, crisp and greaselessly fried with no breading... More