"Life itself is the proper binge." -- Julia Child

I am not a foodie. Not really. Oh, I love to eat, don't get me wrong (you should see my thighs -- wait, no you shouldn't), and I love to travel and check out new restaurants and buy artisanal cheeses and do wine tastings and all that. But I don't cook. I have a classically trained fiance for that. But I can chop vegetables like nobody's business, and I hold my knife correctly. I'd say I'm a foodie by association. I speak the language, but haltingly and with an accent.

But Nutmeg qualifies as a bona fide foodie. I infer that she's gone to culinary school in Paris, and she teaches some cooking classes in her hometown, Milwaukee. She posts lots of yummy sounding recipes and such, which I would so cook if I actually, um, cooked.

Let me just get the design stuff out of the way. Call me girly, but she's got my favorite color: purple. Points for you. Her profile pic is charming. There's a nice variation in length of posts, some short, some long. There's no clutter. None, zero, zip. She could stand to have an About Me page, and maybe put the archives in a drop down box. I'd go for a design with tabs for an about page and recipes. The design could also use a little more flavor, a bit of spice. Although I like the purple and green, there's nothing else going on visually. And lord, how nice it would be to see pictures of some of these tasty goodies she makes.

It's not just recipes, though. Nutmeg not only knows her way around a kitchen, she knows her way around writing, too. This blog is funny and well-written, and she knows what to do with a semi-colon. I gotta love a post that begins: "Last night I had the single worst bathroom experience of my entire life. "

I get the feeling that she doesn't want to share too much, but when she does: wow. She's lived abroad, but we don't hear a lot about those experiences. And I want to. Very much.

Nutmeg's writing is refined, wry, self-aware, and neat, if unassuming. She's been blogging for over a year, and it feels like she's revealing herself layer by layer, but not swiftly enough for me. I want to know more, I want to hear all about this X, why she left New Orleans, what she did in Paris, if she ever went to Pierre Gagnier. I want to know what she wants, who her friends are, what she misses and hopes and fears. I read the blog from beginning to end, and I don't have the answers to these questions. She hasn't posted in a week, and I'm kind of pissed about that, and I've only been familiar with her for, like, two hours.

But there are virtually no comments. Why is this? I'm adding her to my reader and will commence commenting post-haste.

Nutmeg, I like you. Kind of a lot. I'd like to ferret out fabulous dessert places and pop open a bottle of amarone with you. I'd like to trade stories about Europe, too, and discuss the relative merits of gruyere and mimolette. So, come back, post more, and give us a little more meat to go with the small sides you've already given us. Give us some guts, the quinto quarto.

Punch up your design a little, delve a bit deeper in your writing, and I'll slap an "I fucking love you" on it.