Rubee

Best meal I ever ate:

Thankful for lots of special times and fantastic meals. Travel-wise: The first time I had fresh lamb at a friend's home in Auckland NZ; poisson cru and crepes from the roulottes in Tahiti; kokoda and kava at a local couple's traditional wedding in Fiji; Lotus of Siam in Las Vegas; Alain Ducasse sweetbreads and ravioli de foie gras with Alba truffles; Ambrosia on Santorini, Greece; Moreton Bay "bugs" with garlic butter in Australia; too much mead with roast pork shank and colcannon at a B&B in Galway, Ireland; Gordon Ramsay in London; Guy Savoy in Paris. So far in 2012: Frasca in Boulder, CO.

My current drink of choice:

Depends on my mood. Depends on the season. Sazerac. Aviation. Negroni. Rye Manhattan. Sidecar. Vesper. Basil-Hayden or Blanton's bourbon neat. Locally in Phoenix - Julie's cocktails at J&G, Richie's libations at Citizen Public House, Trudy's cocktails at Camelback Inn, Jason's Negroni at T. Cook's, Kris' cocktails at The Parlor & CPH, Rich at Casablanca, Micah at Crudo

I really wish I could:

afford to travel as often as I wanted to.

My "Go-to" dinner party dish:

One? I love to cook, so it depends on the theme, the crowd, the occasion, the featured cocktail.....

My favorite comfort food:

Mom's banh cuon and Auntie's chao gio. Pizza, meatloaf, roast chicken and potatoes,sour cream and Lipton onion dip with Cape Cod chips.

My top 5 favorite restaurants:

PHOENIX More than 5: Christopher's, Binkley's, Nobuo, FnB, Cuoco Pazzo, Talavera, Hana Japanese, Crudo, Noca, Quiessence, Kai. NW Valley neighborhood faves: Mi Comida, Arrowhead Grill, Tutti Santi, Hope Kee. Restaurants to get to in 2012: Atlas Bistro, Vincent's & Bistro, Coup des Tartes, Sophie's Bistro, Los Dos Molinos, Shinbay, Andreoli, and have fry bread, and a combo plate at Chino Bandido.

My most tattered cookbooks:

Dunlop's "Land of Plenty", Hazan's "Essentials of Italian Cooking", Roden's "Arabesque: A Taste of Morocco, Turkey, and Lebanon", Goin's "Sunday Suppers at Lucques", Rodgers "Zuni Cafe".