Well, I didn't win.

...the Manolo essay contest. But that's OK. It was good practice for me to write the essay (300 words is NOT VERY LONG and requires lots of editing skills). Plus, it was worth me paying attention just to read the essay that came in second place. I loved it - it epitomizes the kind of writing I love, hope to do, and actually think I could do if I just got it together and tried a little harder.

In related news, I'm reading a new book that I loooove, purchased especially for me by my mother-in-law on her recent trip to the Culinary Institute of America. It's an anthology of the best food writing of 2005 - just a simple collection of essays. I've read some of them before (several are from Food & Wine), and some of them are better than others, of course, but overall, it's pretty fantastic. The short essays hold my attention for just the right amount of time, and the subject matter makes me constantly hungry, and influences my behavior in an embarrassingly direct way.

On Saturday, I read an essay about Murray's Cheese Shop. I then went to our cheese shop, Atwater's, and bought of a bunch of fancy cheese, some of which is so, um, fragrant that even I have a hard time eating it (it is delicious, but the musty, damp sock odor is tough).

Good food weekend, though. So at least I could drown my writerly sorrows in high-fat-content foods...