Thursday Duke's Mixture

Hey, kids, there sure are a lot of you playing on the Internets these days! Yesterday, we had a record high traffic day with significant new benchmarks set for both page views and unique visitors. After a record October, it's nice to know so many people care about great food (with a fair dose of snark) in Indianapolis.

Beaujolais Day on it's Way: It's that time of year again with the third Thursday in November -- Nov 15 -- fast approaching. If the foodie year had high holy days, Beaujolais Day would usher them in. (I keep typing "beaujolaid" day. What does that mean? I think I could get behind that holiday!) Dr. Vino's take? As long as you're drinking a high carbon footprint wine flown in from France, you might as well drink some good stuff. Skip the Nouveau. Go for the Cru.

Final Culinary Expressions Cafe: If you've been meaning to schedule a night at Ivy Tech's Culinary Expressions Cafe, next Thursday, Nov 15, is your last chance. Culinary students will cook and serve an a' la carte menu with dishes from Mexico, South America, France, Italy, and Spain. Cafe is open 6:00-8:00 p.m. in room 407 at Ivy Tech Community College on Fall Creek Parkway. Call 921-4450 for reservations. Cash only.

What I've Been Drinking: 2001 Carmen Reserve Shiraz/Cab blend from the Maipo Valley. Tasty.

RagingServer.com -- Want to get a first hand look at the life of a server? Raging Server -- a blogger in Nashville -- will give you that look. And it's usually not pretty. You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll tip better.

Achatz Update: A big shout-out and thanks to regular reader and pal KC who emailed yesterday to note I'd missed an update on Grant Achatz. (I've been skimming Ruhlman's blog since I'm behind in watching Next Iron Chef and trying to avoid spoilers.) From Ruhlman:

"...grant finishes radiation this week I believe and tumor virtually gone, docs enormously hopeful. if surgery is necessary, i'm told it will be minor."

Achatz was also featured in People magazine a few weeks ago with a great picture (even hairless, he's cute) and update. The lesson? Patients have to educate themselves and take control of their own treatment. He reports no change in his palette so far except for a minor panic when he accidently downed a Diet Pepsi instead of his usual Diet Coke.