Three Latest and Best

Flatbread at Agio: Forget dinner at Agio, even though I love the restaurant, I should just plan to go and eat nothing but their crispy flatbread brought to the table with numerous replenishments (when I'm there) by very patient waiters. Served with their signature olive oil with sundried tomato.

The Chop Salad at Ruth's Chris: Ode to a salad. If one could list only the simple pleasures in life/one would name this salad. It's rife/with greens, bamboo shoots, artichoke, and cheese./At Ruth's I order it and always say "please". Available in large and small with corresponding amounts of French fried onions on top!

Warm Nuts and an Upgrade: Flying home on Christmas Eve, American Airlines upgraded me to First Class. Not only did our cabin's passengers enjoy many, many mimosas to toast the season, but they were served with warm nuts. I'd forgotten about this little touch -- not all airlines do it. In a world of perpetual airline cutbacks, the simple pleasures count like really great, not overly salted, warm mixed nuts in their own little china dish. (Plus, we got a real meal on china which is always nice but somehow kind of ridiculous with the now-requisite plastic knives and forks.)