From the initial comments on my overview of the new Wild Ginger and its Seattle counterpart today, I can see they're coming out of the woodwork already. Nah, not the attractive hostesses, the servers pointing out the signature dishes that helped put the Ginger atop Zagat's "Most Popular" index for 20 years, nor the sommeliers here to assist with a wide world of grape juice. I'm talking about the readers who need to note you'll find "better," more "authentic" and far less fussy Asian food -- priced for a bargain feeding frenzy -- at restaurants in the ID and Little Saigon, in the strip malls of Redmond, Lynnwood and Federal Way and at the take-out counters of our super Asian supermarkets. To them I say, "Oh, cry me a river!" -- of this:

Malaysian laksa: my go-to dish at Wild Ginger.
Seattle Times photo/Dean Rutz

Yes, there are many, many reasons to frequent Greater Seattle's lesser-sung Asian food haunts. And I do, all the time, as you know if you spend much time here at All You Can Eat. Places like these:

Journalist and author Bruce Buschel is opening a seafood restaurant, and in preparation for that he's put together a two-part list of "100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do." The first debuted in the New York Times last week, the second ran today. His list pushed all the right buttons re: wrong-doing, and I'm not surprised at his readers' (voluminous) reaction, having seen it before when I've delved into the subject of service.

A decade ago, after taking the job as Seattle Times restaurant critic, I posted a list of my own restaurant service peeves -- among them many cited by Buschel. In 2004 I was floored by the volume of commentary after writing "When Restaurant Service Goes South." Two hundred readers e-mailed or called in a single day to offer their two-cents regarding lousy service, a number that was a big deal back before we had global commenting capabilities via our Web site. In 2005 I wrote my "Ten Commandments of Restaurant Behavior" -- a how-to for diners, with restaurant pros weighing in on how we can all get along better, regardless of which side of the table we're on. And again, readers rewarded me with commandments of their own.

As a former waitress, a longtime restaurant critic and someone who dines out often and loves the restaurant business -- imperfect though it may be, I think Buschel's list provides excellent advice, as well as some "in your dreams, pal" suggestions.

On the eve of the Dahlia Lounge's 20th Anniversary celebration , Jackie Cross confirms what I heard this morning: she and her husband and business partner Tom Douglas will open another restaurant next door to Etta's in April.

Pots, pans, another restaurant. You'd be smiling, too.

You know the space as the home furnishings store, Habits, on the corner of Western Avenue and Virginia. The idea for the new place "is a work in progress," says Jackie, and while the details remain under wraps for now, it will not be an extension of Etta's, she says. It will, however, "be a whole new world, a whole new thing. We're super excited."

Be still my beating BBQ lovin' heart: that rascal Casper Townsend has gone and done it again, only this time he's opening another outlet of Casper's a Taste of the South even closer to my front door. If all goes accordingly -- and I'm counting on it -- he and his staff of rib-ticklin' Southern foodstuff-savvy servers will be yelling "Come and get it!" in Shoreline by early next month.

Casper, smiling at his Lake Forest Park "Come-get-some, Sugah!" shack.

If you're a food-blogging Tweet-and-greeter, chances are I ran into you last night at the second Foodportunity event at the Palace Ballroom. These food-networking shindigs, put together by Frantic Foodie Keren Brown, are a lot of fun for a social butterfly like me, and they're open to the public, so stay tuned for the next one. While there, I heard Ethan Stowell tell an audience he prefers not to read blog-reviews while Kurt Dammeier swears he loves them.

Panelists (from left) Kurt Dammeier, Tamara Murphy, Ethan Stowell
(photo/Nate Naismith, Far Sighted Images)

I learned that a very excited Seif Chirchi and Rachel Yang of Joule just got back from filming "Iron Chef" in NYC -- in time to make apple head cheese for the masses (they even brought the head). And also that Jackie Cross is keeping her fingers crossed that her darling daughter, Miss Loretta Douglas (who's got a restaurant nicknamed after her) may soon be cookin' on local TV, something she proved she could do on King 5 last summer.

Good thing I don't have a sweet tooth, or like many of you, I'd be in real trouble this morning, keeping my hands out of this grab-bag:

I can see our dentist Dr. Joe right now, rubbing his hands together while his office staff laughs and says, "Operators are standing by!"

If you've been following Seattle's contenders on "Top Chef" this season, you likely know Ashley Merriman, chef-exec at Belltown's Branzino, has been eliminated. Last week, she severed ties with Branzino -- ties that have been tenuous over the past months.

"I left Seattle in August," said the chef, now living in NYC where she's finishing her commitments to "Top Chef" (which includes filming a reunion show) and lending her friend Alexandra Guarnaschelli and the owners of Butter a hand as they prepare to open a second restaurant in Charlotte, NC (perhaps you've seen Alex's TV appearances on her new Food Network show, "Alex's Day Off").

Merriman worked for Guarnaschelli at Butter for two-plus years before moving to Seattle in 2005, and will be working there again full-time come January. Here, she cooked alongside Maria Hines at Earth & Ocean, and later with their friend Dana Tough (of Spur and Tavern Law) at Hine's Wallingford restaurant, Tilth. Prior to taking the reins at Branzino, she was Tamara Murphy's sous at Brasa. Balancing her gig as executive chef at Branzino with her role as a "Top Chef" contender has been difficult, Merriman explains.

Ashley Merriman (photo courtesy Bravo TV)

Yesterday's e-mail inbox included a note from a guy who grew up in Louisiana, lived in Seattle for 16 years and is now back in New Orleans, where yesterday's front-page news in the Times-Picayune included this headliner: "Louisiana blasts new FDA rule requiring oysters to be sterilized to prevent rare bacterial illness." The story said, in part:

"The rule will essentially eliminate raw oysters -- at least as Louisianans know them -- from restaurant menus for seven months of the year. Even oysters that will eventually be cooked during those months would have to go through the same cleansing process before being added to any dish, a move some say would undermine the culinary integrity of some of New Orleans' most famous delicacies."

The reason behind this politically and emotionally charged move, defined by one oyster industry representative as "a nuclear bomb," is to reduce the rare but potentially fatal bacterial illness Vibrio vulnificus, contracted by eating raw Gulf Coast oysters.

Louisiana oysters and a cold Abita, which I knocked back in New Orleans early this month.

Meanwhile, here in Seattle and throughout the Northwest, restaurants are celebrating the joys of slurping raw oysters. Special events include tonight's oyster fete at Cafe Campagne, oyster promotions at Anchovies & Olives and Flying Fish (which just inaugurated its annual weekday oyster happy hour from 4-6 p.m.) and the upcoming Oyster New Year's at Elliott's Oyster House (where you can down umpteen rounds of briny bivalves November 7).

All of which might lead you to ask of that FDA ban, "Will Northwest oysters be affected?" and more importantly, "Are our oysters safe?" The short answers: perhaps and yes, according to Robin Downey, executive director of the Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association.

While we occasionally see an increase in oyster-related illness locally due to the naturally occuring bacterium Vibrio parahaemolyticus, "We do not have the Vibrio vulnificus virus found in warm Gulf waters," said Downey, who represents 140 Western shellfish companies that produce 94 million pounds of live oysters a year, an $84 million business.