We attended Lark's annual Whole Beast dinner last month. It's a distinctive eat-a-thon for which chef/owner John Sundstrom procures himself a whole pig and a whole lamb (when we went a few years ago, there was a goat too), then he and some chef friends go about making unique dinner treats from delicious random portions of the beloved creatures. I plan to post a blog item about the dinner in this next week or so, to fill you in on more details.

My bus dropped me off nearby about 30 minutes early. (Yes, I take the BUS a few times a month to get around, how green of me!) What's a girl to do but go kill time next door at the lovely Licorous, also owned by John and his partners. One reason I love this place is that they have a bounty of gins on their shelf, a lovely sight to behold for this gin-lover. There's one to suit whatever mood I'm in, whether it's a smooth, balanced Plymouth or the more bold, evergreen kick you get from Junipero gin.

Of their house concoctions using gin, I opted for the Pendennis Club cocktail, using the complex, delicious Martin Miller's gin (one of my all-time favorites) with apricot liqueur, lime juice and Peychaud's bitters. Usually I'd run away screaming from any cocktail with apricot liqueur, but this had a nearly imperceptible tiny dose that simply balanced well with the tart of the lime and the aromatics of the gin. Yummy.

Licorous' great cocktail list comes with a delightful perk: for just a couple bucks more, you can have a nibble of something savory (or sometimes sweet) to have alongside said cocktail. In honor of the feast I was about to have next door, I chose a combination of pork belly and bright arugula salad that proved to be the perfect amuse bouche before the feast.

I've recently posted a more detailed item about this on my blog, but wanted to share the thoughts--and a brief request--here as well. At a culinary conference last month, I attended a workshop about creating a "food life list." Now, I know many people have been drafting life lists for some time now, joyously marking off each adventure and accomplishment as they go down the list. I just am not one of those people.

The food life list, however, proved an enchanting draw. In no small part because the workshop speaker, farmer-writer Mas Masumoto from California, blew my mind at another conference a few years ago and I didn't want to miss whatever he had to share. It was a dynamic, engaging, wonderful hour and a half, Mas joined by his wife and daughter in sharing their life experiences and goals.

Being a good workshop, the presentation came with some assignments and activities. I was rather perplexed and disappointed in myself when it came time to jot down items for our own food life lists. It's a wide world of amazing food experiences out there! And though I've got a pretty healthy list of memorable moments under my belt, I couldn't manage to muster inspiration for the yet-to-be-discovered food pinnacles still to go.

I sputtered out after just a few items--eating my fill of porcini at a mushroom festival in northern Italy, enjoying fireside raclette in an alpine chalet, attending an August crayfish party in Sweden. Clearly I determined that any worthy food ambition would involve some travel!

It occurred to me that the most memorable food experiences I've had in my life were things that I wouldn't have even known to put on such a list. That astonishing king crab on Kodiak Island, cooked in a huge pot of sea water just minutes from being hauled up in traps. Or the dinner shared at Château du Feÿ, prepared by a visiting Russian colleague, which started with my first taste of impeccable sevruga caviar and delicious Russian vodka (yes, some vodka does have flavor).

So here's my request. I'm sure all of you have had your own variety of once-in-a-lifetime food experiences. I'd love to hear what they are, to help spur me and others on to interesting and diverse considerations for a food life list. Or just go to the blog post and add a comment there. I promise to share at least some of the collective ideas on my blog over this coming month. While I still think many of the most memorable food experiences will be those we could never expect or dream up ourselves, I do think we can collectively help each other create a to-do list of amazing food moments to seek out.

There's a new mushroom festival popping up in the area next month, the Pacific Northwest Mushroom Festival down in Nisqually. The organizers told me they're modeling it after the OysterFest in Shelton each October, which totally got my attention: that's a great oyster festival! I'll be there, Wild Mushroom cookbooks in tow, doing a recipe demonstration. Since it's a first-ever festival, I can't say much about the specifics of the weekend, though the web site does offer some preview of activities and other information. I'm on tap Sunday, June 29 at 1:00, sticking around to sign cookbooks after the demonstration.

And a note for your July calendar while I'm at it. I'm a huge fan of FareStart here in Seattle, a nationally recognized program that teaches homeless and disadvantaged people cooking skills to help them get back on their feet, take control of their lives and move forward with jobs in the restaurant world. On the evening of July 9 they'll be holding one of their annual fundraisers, Guest Chef on the Waterfront. It features some of the city's top chefs (including Aaron Wright from Canlis and Tom Black from 35th St Bistro), as well as breweries, wineries and food purveyors. Live jazz, games and a lovely waterfront setting add to the festivity. I'll be on hand to help judge the best of the bites that the chefs serve up that night. Tickets purchased before June 1 go for just $60, after that it's $70. So don't delay. I hope I might see you there.

Have you checked out the series Gourmet's Diary of a Foodie yet? I hadn't until I got a call last fall about being part of a shoot here in the Seattle area. Now I'm a big fan. It's something of an antithesis of the Food Network programming that relies so heavily on celebrity and personality-driven programming. With Diary, each show's 'star' is a theme that gets attention from a number of angles, with experts often well outside the American culinary mainstream.

For instance, the "H2O" show last year included some quality time with my pal Jon Rowley (who they called an 'oyster zealot'!) on the Hood Canal shores near Quilcene talking about the importance of water in the life of an oyster. Other snippets included a shop in Italy selling gourmet water, discussion of the role of alkaline water in the making of dim sum and time in the life of a Spanish fisherman.

The episode I'm part of, The Inventors, debuted earlier this month, though it doesn't yet show up on the schedule of my Seattle PBS station, so I haven't seen it yet. You can catch a brief preview of the episode here. I was a sort of journalistic sidekick to Nathan Myhrvold, technology guru and innovator whose love of cooking drove him to design a phenomenal kitchen with lots of high-tech toys. (The photo here is courtesy of Zero Point Zero Production, Inc.) It is the kind of culinary playground that would make many a chef whimper with envy; I was thrilled to be part of this shoot and tag along while Nathan showed off his toys and recipes. Check out any of the episodes that show up on your local PBS station; I haven't seen a dud yet. Sometimes esoteric, but never dull. And a welcome change in television food programming.

I'm also on tap to be one of the editors of a fascinating book that Nathan is working on, which I believe will be briefly mentioned in that Diary episode. The book is described as "a highly illustrated and approachable book on the most important techniques of modernist cuisine." I'm staying away from the science end of things (one semester of physics was all I could handle), focusing more on general edits and the kitchen perspective. I know it's going to be an education in itself, reading the text and hearing how Nathan translates for we lay-cooks the "underlying scientific principles that are most useful for innovative chefs to understand." It's a large, research-heavy project that will be released in the next couple of years.

By the way, do they even have tubes in televisions any more?

This recipe choice celebrates the news that the first load of Copper River salmon is due to hit the tarmac later this week. Like swallows back to Capistrano, it's a sign that salmon season is about to begin.

Fennel is one of the most complex, multi-faceted flavors, which can be really fun to play with in the kitchen. Fresh fennel bulbs, in particular, are wonderfully versatile. The crisp bulb can be cut into broad slices for an addition to a crudité platter, sliced super thin to add to a salad (I love pairing fennel with slices of peppery radish). The bulb can also be cooked: braised or in a gratin to serve as a side dish, simmered with vegetables in a rustic stew or adding an elegant touch to a dish such as with this salmon. I even use the tender fennel fronds in salads, and chop up the tough stalks to add to vegetable stock or poaching water for salmon or crab.

In this recipe, fennel's hint of sweetness and delicate anisey flavor pair beautifully with rich salmon. The other flavorings of the dish--Pastis, garlic, saffron--hint at bouillabaisse, the inspiration for this combination. I top things off with a delicious aïoli accented with the earthy flavor of pimenton de la vera, smoked paprika from Spain.