Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

Dr Brown's Diet Cherry - It's my go-to soda Not so sweet and, to me, doesn't taste like cherry candy like so many of the others do.

I did a postdoc in Geneva after years of eating Campbell's soup for dinner during grad school. Fell in love with French food. Friends would supply great bottles of wine and I felt obligated to cook "up to" the wine. Also, all of us ex-pat postdocs (US, UK,NZ, etc) used to make treks to various Michelin restaurants and vineyards in Burgundy. And...I like to eat.

Mostly use cookbooks [just about all of the above] for ideas - but have gleaned wonderful recipes form Julia Child and Company (1&2) and Cooking the Nouvelle Cuisine in America (Urvater and Liederman).

Grilled fresh foie gras (with diced mango, port soaked prunes and sherry wine vinegar) over brioche toasts, with duck fat fried potatoes [and green beans to assuage the guilt some]. Quite delicious.

Food related collections: spatulas made of various woods, favorite being olive; vintage cooking tools and pots collected at flea markets (mostly while living in Switzerland during the 70s), but it continues; coffee mugs; small stainless bowls for mise en place; Swiss potato peelers; cookbooks; herbs and spices, including anceint ones even though I know they don't last forever, I enjoy the continuity and knowing I have that ancient bottle of fenugreek on hand; and many more.

I eat out alone a lot - locally for lunch and traveling on business. Always with a book, generally fiction [even at home]. I use a really convenient book holder/cover doohickey that holds the book open and makes reading and eating quite easy. Check it out at: http://www.jbcreations.net/
But I'll probably get a Kindle. Hope it's the conversation starter for me that it is for ocarol [actually my jb creations book holder has started lots of conversations].