The Ricotta Hotcakes from Sydney Food by Bill Granger are easily some of the best pancakes in the world, as JenJen from Milk and Cookies found out when she made a batch for herself. The pancakes manage to have a tremendous amount of flavor and an incredibly light texture all at the same time. In all honesty, the pancakes need nothing on them, but original version served at bills in Sydney is heavenly and comes with sliced bananas and honeycomb butter, which is a compound butter made with crushed honeycomb candy (like the inside of a Violet Crumble) and a touch of real honey. JenJen just used real honeycomb to top hers for an interesting, but simple, twist. Whatever you use, you won't regret trying the recipe for a second.

Some foods are meant to go together. In fact, many of them pair so well that they have become the most classic comfort foods. In an effort to bypass the well-known, I first set out to collect the 8 worst food pairings, but was so disgusted by the idea of pickled herring and cheesecake that I was forced to stop. I realized that it is for good reason that some foods get paired: they taste great together and make such good combinations that it is hard to think of one without the other. These are definitely a few of the best:

1. Peanut butter and jelly
2. Macaroni and cheese
3. Fish and chips (or burgers and fries)
4. Bacon and eggs
5. Milk and cookies
6. Pancakes and syrup
7. Gin and tonic
8. Spaghetti and meatballs

Salt and pepper is, arguably, the ultimate combination, though they are seasonings and not exactly "food". Here are some of the runners up from the list above: Butter and toast, cupcakes and sprinkles, tomato soup and grilled cheese, cheese and crackers and Ben and Jerry’s.

I know there are lots of others. What are we missing?

Cookies and milk left out for Santa is Christmas Eve tradition that I like to follow in the event that Santa stops by and wants a snack as he travels the world delivering presents. I even set aside a few of the prettier cookies I decorated a day or two before to make sure I have some to leave out. Of course, he doesn't usually seem too interested in the cookies and I end up eating them myself on Christmas morning. Cookies left out overnight can, in my opinion, be deemed "leftovers" and, thus, are appropriate breakfast food.  USA Today says that 48% of people who leave snacks for Santa leave both cookies and milk. I am among the 29% that only leaves cookies, not because I believe Santa is lactose intolerant, as the makers of Lactaid would have me believe, but because milk left out overnight is not very appetising in the morning. If he didn't eat the cookies, Santa probably wasn't very thirsty anyway.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]