Dear Friends and Family,

        I would be living in a vacuum without New York Times Style. Every Sunday and Thursday I get to sniff the scent of fashion, trends in modern love, and the latest miracle of cosmetics marketing. Without Style I'd never have noticed that small breasts are pleasing their owners in a big way. As I smiled at the pleasant notion of women falling in love with whatever they've got and bra makers producing wispy little lacy A-minus cuplets just for the modestly endowed, I couldn't help but notice what difficulty The Times had actually uttering, much less printing, the word "breast." "Small-chested" is how they put it. "Women with just a bit on top." "Nearly ironing board flat" "modest busts"  "Lilliputian busts" "A-cup pride" "Inconspicuous bosoms." "Bust-challenged."  Wow. I think they did all that without help from the Thesaurus.

        I have never heard a small breasted woman refer to herself as "small chested." The chest is the foundation, the

Women and surely the men who love them will recognize our colors this week, lingerie nude and sultry black.

        For the New York food world it was all Eataly all week around the block. The Eataly family - Mario Batali, the Bastianichs (Lidia and Joe) and their moneybags from Italy, Oscar Farinetti, creator of Eataly in Torino - expected curious crowds when they opened at 4 P.M. on Tuesday but not such persistent mobs. New Yorkers, Italians in multi-generational clusters, savvy tourists sweating in tank tops, shouldered into the Tasting Piazza demanding salumi and formaggio, taxing the staff of 200 or so, many racing around in orange rubber crocs like their fearless leader.

        There were some shoppers filling their translucent green plastic carts.  My friend Barry Wine got the vegetable butcher to peel his fava beans - no extra charge. I got stood up at 7:30 A.M. Thursday when Mario failed to show for a breakfast date leaving me to wander the just waking gastronomica without a bombolini. Of course I tweeted, click here for the play by play. His email canceling had disappeared into my spam but I wouldn't have seen it anyway because I don't look at the computer after I leave my office.   

        Steven and I grazed on pizzas and pasta opening night, came back for a white tablecloth dinner at Manzo next day and again, on Saturday to taste the catch of the day at Il Pesce. The Road Food Warrior insisted on buying 50 cent clams from the fishmonger to eat at our table rather than paying $15 for 6 off the menu. "I should call security," Lidia murmured.  But she didn't.  I wouldn't test her again. To read what we tasted, click here.

        Vandaag announced itself as a "Gin Bar and Bakery." I liked the idea of a gin tasting with foods from Holland. My imagination faltered. All I knew of the Netherlands, never having been, was tulips, Edam, Anne Frank and Van Gogh. I supposed there would be potatoes.  And there were: weird and fabulous "hete bliksem," translated as "hot lightening, crisp fingerlings fried with bacon, apple and caramel-like stroop (syrup) with the chef's added kick of citrus and cayenne. Six dollars seems excessive for a bread basket but I have to admit I loved the cakey semolina with figs and the pumpernickel crisps.  For more on what a passionate chef can do inspired by ten days in Amsterdam, click here. 103 Second Avenue near 6th Street.

        I felt so guilty inflicting a listless round of Lebanese mezze on our next door neighbors one evening last week that I insisted we jump into a cab and seek comfort immediately at The Brooklyn Diner. We'd been there a few weeks earlier with family in tow, my nephew's six and eight year olds and an infant in a high chair. A grilled cheese sandwich from the children's menu and spaghetti with meatballs kept the boys from starving. I believe the baby ate whatever her mother put in her mouth, screeching with joy between each bite. That night eight of us divided one slice of strawberry cheesecake.

        But tonight required more intense indulgence.  Each of the guys ordered his own Strawberry Blonde. Diane and I shared a hot fudge sundae with chocolate instead of vanilla ice cream. Dessert and coffee cost nearly as much as the desultory mezze but the gloom had lifted and I was happily licking the fudge off my lips as we got into a taxi promising I wouldn't feel guilty till tomorrow at Tara.

        Top Chef and Top Chef Masters competitions are challenging especially when the show throws in a curve. But making an omelet with one hand tied behind your back or producing dinner in a dormitory room with a blender and a toaster oven will seem like child's play half an hour into the emotionally harrowing competition staged for the honor of being named Meilleurs Ouvriers de France (Best Worker), the punishing pastry Olympics filmed for the first time by Chris Hegedus and D. A. Pennebaker in "Kings of Pastry," opening here September 15.  To win the coveted MOF honor, the highest distinction France awards artisans in every field, requires years of training, rehearsals, sacrifice and expense. The filmmakers chose to follow Jacquy Pfeiffer from the French Pastry School in Chicago as he preps and packs for the ordeal at home, practices yet again with French butter and flour in France, and finally, as he takes his dream into the huge open kitchen in Lyons where the silence is almost painful.

        France's pastry MOF are the judges and mentors. The timing is strict. Each day starts before dawn. Even the cleanliness of the competitors aprons counts and garbage is checked for signs of cheating. A blown sugar sculpture or an arch that cracks as it reaches the display table can be the end of a four year dream. The great patissiers of France come to judge the sheen and taste. Watching Pierre Hermé's face in the judging tells more then words. At first you want to giggle at the intense debate and anxiety over a cream puff flounce, as if it were the timing of the landing at Normandy. But in spite of the silly music track I found myself drawn in to the suspense. At the tense finale there are tears, possibly your own.