LostBread

Location:

Brooklyn and New Orleans

Best meal I ever ate:

A dozen oysters and a soft-shell crab loaf at Casamento's when they reopened after Katrina.

My current drink of choice:

A manhattan in the winter, a ramoz gin fizz in the spring, a margarita in summer, my husband's all-spice dram old fashioned in the fall

I really wish I could:

Figure out how to make a buttermilk drop like McKenzie's.

My "Go-to" dinner party dish:

A leg of lamb and a gratin dauphinois.

My favorite comfort food:

Macaroni and cheese.

My top 5 favorite restaurants:

NOLA: Casamento's, Gautreau's, Galatoire's, Domilise's, La Petite Grocery. New York: Blue Hill Stone Barns, Le Bernardin, Ai Di La, The Spotted Pig, Sushi of Gari. Elsewhere: Pepe's in New Haven, Brasserie Lipp in Paris, Antica Trattoria della Gigina in Bologna.

My most tattered cookbooks:

Marcella Hazan's Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, The Herbfarm Cookbook, The Plantation Cookbook, Gourmet's Best Desserts, back-issues of Saveur