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It has actually been a while since I last put down Heat - or to give its full title, Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany.

Let's start this with an important question. When you eat grapes, do you:

My new refrigerator finally got installed on Friday. After some long hours of procrastination and drooling over appliance porn, I eventually went with a smaller, less-feature-rich, yet much "greener" model. (Actually two models, since we got a separate small freezer to go with the fridge.) It's not as sexy as the glamorous models in those appliance centerfolds, but it has a lot of features that suit the way I cook and shop for food.

Most people who familiar with the world of food blogs know Tigers and Strawberries already, but for those of you who don't, now is as good a time as any to introduce you to Barbara and her vigorous writing. Why? Because she's just had a beautiful baby girl. You can see a picture of tiny Kat.

(Posted by Max: Maki is out of commission since her Powerbook's system disk went belly up yesterday.)

When Sam from Becks & Posh announced the Wine Blogging Wednesday #25 to be about Champagne, it gave me a reason to dig a bit through the cellar, where I found a long-forgotten bottle of a Champagne Fleury which must be almost 10 years old.

I am eternally grateful that the BBC broadcasts free-to-air on satellite, and that I live within reception range. I feel a bit guilty that I don't have to pay anything to view the Beeb as UK residents do, and believe me if they started to bill me something I'd pay it without question. The BBC has the best programming, bar none, of any network I've ever seen in any country. (I'm even a closet East Enders watcher, but don't tell anyone.)

The top black bowl is resin; the bottom two are real lacquered bowls.

Just a quick note to say, first of all, a big thanks to everyone who participated in this second round of Food Destinations. The roundup will be posted very soon (hopefully today...just waiting for a couple of promised late entries... :))

This is my entry for Food Destinations #2: My Local Market.

There are several fresh food markets in Zürich. I was actually going to talk about another one, but someone else had covered it already (as you'll see in the roundup!), so I decided to head to the market at Helvetiaplatz.