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By JEFF HOUCK, The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 26, 2007

For my last printed understatement of the year, let me again say that I have lucked into the best job in journalism.

People invite me to the most vital part of their homes, the kitchen. I chat with some of the greatest chefs in the world and the best home cooks you could ever imagine. I am reminded constantly that every restaurant, every plate of food, every hot dog stand and every cookbook is part of someone's dream.

Food is a statement of who we are and who we can become. For many, food can be an on-ramp to a better life. More than just fueling our bodies, it brings us together and gives us a common denominator: Everyone eats.

For me, writing about it all is a form of therapy. There's simply no way at times to decompress from all the amazing opportunities I get each week while producing this section; writing the food blog, The Stew; and doing the Table Conversations podcasts. The year 2007 was cram-packed with those moments.

During an interview with Food Network star Paula Deen in June, which we started a few minutes after I ran through an afternoon rainstorm, she exclaimed, "Why are you sweating so much? You look like a fat girl who's nervous about writing her first love letter."

I got to meet brothers Rick and Joe Shirley, owners of Rick's Meats and Smokin' Joe's BBQ, who, after years of working in the grocery industry, started their businesses after their side jobs of cutting and smoking wild game for local hunters outgrew the butcher shop in Rick's back yard.

I traded e-mails about a chili cook-off at the South Pole with a woman nicknamed "Sandwich," who worked at McMurdo Station. The cook-off (slogan: "Making people chili since 1957") is an annual event during which bands play music and inhabitants of the research station cook crockpots of chili inside the shelter of decorated storage containers.

I had the pleasure of discovering the delicious Saussison Sec (French sausage) sandwich at La Sandwicherie in Miami Beach. It's a tiny walk-up, sit-at-a-barstool-along-the-window shop on 14th Avenue across from Club Deuce. Very popular with drunks and people wearing tight clothing.

I met 10-year-old Hunter Horne and his family at their home in Parrish. Hunter loves to cook, mostly because he loves to watch recipes being created on the Food Network. He shared with me a notebook he keeps. Inside are sketches of restaurants he hopes to open. The drawings were so private and personal to him that he hadn't even shown his mother.

For Valentine's Day, I convinced three retiree husbands to sample the flavors of edible undergarments while their wives were traipsing around the Florida State Fairgrounds. All of them approved of the candy bra. The chewable panty? Not so much.

During the Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, I met Jim Sleep, head chef for Team Penske. Sleep had two trucks full of kitchen and dining equipment, but his real pride and joy, beyond cooking for hundreds of diners each weekend, was the Big Green Egg smoker he carts from race to race.

I had the honor of standing in Italian cooking doyenne Marcella Hazan's kitchen with her son, Giuliano. I enjoyed the delicious pierogi made by Marek Pietryniak at his Egyptian-themed restaurant Pierogi Grill in Clearwater. I ate at arguably the best restaurant in America, Alinea in Chicago, and then got to interview chef Grant Achatz for more than an hour. I chatted with Alice Waters about the benefits of simple food. I traded tequila stories with Sammy Hagar.

Tripe soup, barbecue eel, boneless duck feet, goat stew, fried pig intestine and Dead Man's Foot meatloaf were all on my plate this year. In Tampa, no less. And I lived to tell the tale.

Yes, seeing the world from the end of a fork and the bottom of a wine glass and then getting to share that experience has to be one of life's great privileges. That anyone takes time to read, listen and watch any of it is a great compliment.

I can't wait to see what flavors 2008 will bring to our table.

Hungry for more? Read

Jeff Houck's multimedia

food blog, The Stew,

at keyword: Stew.

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