X-posted from Facebook Notes:


Alafair Burke's Duffer Awards poll -- www.alafairburke.com -- inspires me to share some of my more crazed foodie moments. In no particular order.

It was 2008 and I had to take a train to Bridgeport, CT, with my stepson because Mr. Lippman was in New York. Checking the train schedule, I realized that the Acela, which overshot Bridgeport, did stop in New Haven, which is said to be home to some of the country's best pizza. Why couldn't we rendezvous there and drive back to Bridgeport? We did and, because of our devotion to fair play in food tasting, we smuggled one pizzaria's slices into the other and ate them side by side.

We have done multiple cheese steak tastings in Philadelphia at Pat's and Geno's. The best one is inevitably the one we eat first.

Last weekend in Florida, we had to be at the airport, a 25 minute drive, by 1 p.m.. The amazing sushi restaurant in our hotel opened at noon. Mr. Lippman and the stepson (called such because poor kid doesn't need me to embarrass him any more) hit the sushi restaurant at exactly noon, ordered sashimi and sushi and tartare while waiting for to-go order of the restaurant's version of "katsu," a minced beef sandwich that they happen to make with Kobe beef. It was like the Italian Job of foodie adventures.

Last month, we had promised to bring bagels and the proper accessories to a brunch in New York City. I walked 14 blocks north to Absolute Bagels, while Mr. Lippman took the subway to Russ & Daughters, then we met at our friends' apartment.

Leaving New York last summer, we went by way of Brooklyn to go to DiFara's pizza. It was closed for vacation. So we drove to Coney Island and went to Totonno's.

In 2006, when Bouchercon was held in Madison, I figured out it would be faster/easier to fly to Chicago and drive north. I persuaded four others to do the same -- and made them all stop at Culver's, so I could have the cheese curds I remember so fondly from my summer camp days.

In 1981, my college friends and I went away for a weekend. We heard that Milwaukee had great ice cream, so we asked a nice police officer to guide us to a good place. One of my friends, whom I will not name here, was obsessed with trying the then-new confection known as a Twix Bar and I shot a photo essay of the momentous event.

1983, same friends, now in New Orleans: Despite meals at Galatoire's, Commander's Palace and the Acme, I still remember eating peanut M&M's while standing in line at Preservation Hall.

Summer of 2001: I flew to the Midwest to join Mr. Lippman and son on a baseball trip. They were dubious that someone with my credentials (an eating lightweight by their standards) could know anything of barbecue, but I told them that I had been reading Calvin Trillin since 1981 and wanted to go to Arthur Bryant's for a burnt-edges sandwich. The next day, when they dropped me at the airport, presumably en route to Iowa and the Field of Dreams, they immediately doubled back for another meal at Arthur Bryant's.

Taco Cabana. I went to the original, on Hildebrand and San Pedro, and while its proliferation as a chain was a boon in some ways, the original was special.

If I were on I-35 between Dallas and Waco, I would probably stop in West for kolaches.

Raised by a man who believed one must always make good time, married to a man who is profoundly unfamiliar with this concept, I'm never sure what to do when I pass the Kiwanis barbecue stands between Baltimore and the Delaware beaches.

I once had great Indian food in Laredo, Texas.