Even if you just order a cup of coffee, you can enjoy the lovely indoor flora and open ceiling at this place. The room is just the right size, with seating for about 25. A table for two in the corner can be quite a romantic affair.

There's cinnamon roll French toast, French toast sticks, even stuffed French toast. All these things are great (usually "for a limited time") at some 24-hour breakfast joint, but the best French toast has no gimmick. It's thick, soaked instead of battered and thick, thick, thick. What better way to achieve such qualities than to use fresh challah (Jewish egg bread) instead of skinny little pieces of white bread? That's what the Bronx offers on its Sunday brunch menu, and we're sure Mom would be embarrassed to serve that skimpy Wonder Bread version after having a gander at this one. Two slices of thick, flavorful toast lie temptingly bordered by a pitcher of warm syrup, real whipped cream, strawberries and butter for use at the diner's discretion. One bite and the firm crusty edges give way to the tender heart of the challah, and Sunday morning magically fills with tasty bliss.

There may be better-tasting margaritas in town. There may be more authentic margaritas in town. But with a Blue Goose margarita, you will get 2 full ounces of tequila in your luscious, lime-kissed adult beverage, which means you will more quickly get lit--and that is, quite frankly, the point when drinking margaritas. No one says, "Honey, let's have a light supper, one margarita and then go to the book signing." No. People who drink margaritas say things like, "You're hot! Where do you go to school?" and, "C'mon, show us the bruise on your butt. Pleeeaaase." The best way to drink a Blue Goose margarita (or five) is this way: After getting paired up for 18 holes with Blue Goose owner-guy Bob, you should discover that not only is he a top-notch golfer, but that, when the mood strikes him, he will invite you to his establishment for drinks, for which he will pay. You should also discover that he will chat up the two young ladies next to you and announce to you and your two friends, "Boys, these girls are dead ready." He will then leave and allow you to make margarita-filled asses of yourselves, which will cause you to write a Best Of item that appears to be a tout for said margaritas but is in fact a thinly veiled apology to Becca and Sylvia, the dead-ready girls at the Blue Goose bar. Because good margaritas will make you do stuff like that. And Blue Goose has some damn good margaritas.

According to recent polls, a slight majority of Americans believe that Congress should curtail First Amendment rights. Freedom and liberty are bad things, apparently. Of course, people admit in those same polls to a certain amount of ignorance regarding the rights guaranteed by the initial addendum to the Constitution. This is why the founding fathers sought to limit voting rights: People are susceptible to cons, fictions and artificial ingredients. Simply put, the masses are not truly qualified to address key issues, and you need look no further than the popularity of margaritas to understand this. Bar patrons order the cocktails frozen, swirled, flavored and sweetened with sugar water--but they rarely order a real margarita. The original cocktail consisted of three ingredients (tequila, orange liqueur and fresh lime juice) served up. It was tart and effective. The versions served by Monica's will kill enough brain cells to make the erosion of rights in the Bush-Rumsfeld-Ashcroft era seem quite acceptable.

Go ahead, ask him anything. Is it acceptable to drop a few ice cubes into wine--even red? What's the best thing for less than $30 that pairs well with steak, fish and salad? Is there really a difference between Australian and New Zealand wines? He answers all questions with an unflappable grace and a frightening level of knowledge. Yep, frightening. He can pair wine within any price range and with any dish on the menu. Even when patrons argue over red or white, he manages to find a compromise suiting all parties. Press him on product from any region or vintage and he's likely to launch into a lengthy discussion of vineyards, soil, weather, fermentation technique--stuff you'll forget in a matter of minutes but wish you could remember the next time you stop by Sigel's. Wine, after all, changes from year to year, and to keep up requires an astounding level of devotion. For wealthy patrons, he builds wine cellars and stocks them with collectible vintages. For the rest of us, Lincicome happily points out value items, great-tasting wines for a decent price.

Raw beef in Texas is generally good for just one thing: grills. But what do you get when you slap raw beef with French rigor? One thing you don't get is freedom flanks. Another thing you don't get is modesty. Café C's menu, created by Frenchman and "C" owner Francois Fotre, boasts that its steak tartare is "simply the best." And its home of Little Elm, a mere mattress dimple in the stretch of bedroom communities hugging Lewisville Lake, is not a destination by any stretch. But 48 minutes of drive time seems a reasonable price for this mound of raw meat. It's not so much the rich meat--urged into sublime flavors with a spicy dressing of egg yolk, mustard, cayenne, chopped capers, paprika, red wine vinegar and a little lemon--that draws. It's the substitution of traditional toast points with house-made pommes frites (otherwise known as freedom fries). Why spread raw meat on toast when it's much easier and tastier to gouge a pinch of ground carnality with a fry tip?

Maguire's owner Mark Maguire laments that his North Dallas New American restaurant is a little too upscale for his tastes; his customers seem to keep pushing the check average up while he wrestles them by dropping prices. Maybe Maguire is a little off in that way. Maybe he doesn't understand that if you train your service staff to sincerely treat diners as special guests, they want to come to your restaurant and give you money; sometimes lots of it. People are funny that way. They like to unload cash on those who make them feel good. Maguire's servers don't miss a beat (and if they do, they quickly find it and replace it). They smile, they laugh, they know the menu, they're polite, and they watch for things that need to be done (even if you didn't notice the napkin slipped off your lap) and execute without the programmed jargon and choreography that can give dining that scripted-ad-libs-from-a-Dean Martin-celebrity-roast aura. Maguire is set to open a "casual" spot called M Grill & Tap on Cedar Springs in November. But if he doesn't watch his step, this one will scramble away from him up the scale ladder as well.

It's a hideously decadent thing, and so delicious you can skip the prolific and endless skewers of red meat plus some paler varieties served here. A sprawling black marble bar in front of this restaurant's Brazilian grills contains some of the freshest, most sumptuous spreads of leafy, seedy, and rooty food in Dallas. Big bowls of fresh salads. Tabbouleh. Hearts of palm. Bright, juicy tomato slices. Supple artichoke hearts stuffed with tuna salad. Asparagus. Mushrooms. Even those vegetables that as children we would scrape from our plates and hide in the potted African violets take on new luster here. Brussels sprouts, for instance. Meat even creeps in. On an island in front of the salad bar is a hunk of prosciutto that sits behind cutting boards blanketed with thin slices of the stuff, along with a little salami. It's not entirely healthy, but at least the cholesterol won't leak from your tear ducts as it does after filling up on the glistening meat impaled on those skewers.

La Duni bills itself as the ultimate "Mestizo experience," a blend of "European traditions with Latin American soul," and nowhere is the blending more mysteriously seductive than in the chip salsa La Duni puts on the table. Made with fresh poblano, chipotle and serrano peppers and mixed dried chilies, all grilled with tomato, onion, garlic, lime and cilantro, the mojo salsa at La Duni is a global experience.

Fungus is mostly a bore, except when it's between your toes. Yet this same sort of urgency can be coaxed out of a mushroom every now and again. Avanti's stuffed portobello Florentine with glazed chablis béchamel and Parmesan cheese is a lusty fungus treatment. Centered on a fleshy portobello cap complemented--but not in any way smothered--by the rich flavors of the clean, smooth sauce, this dish is a masterpiece of understated richness; of hearty meatiness that can only come from a toadstool relentlessly pestered with dairy products.

Prince of Hamburgers has a certain low-tech charm rarely found in fast-food restaurants, what with pneumatic tubes at Chick-Fil-A and TollTag drive-throughs at McDonald's. At Prince, you simply roll into a space, turn on your headlights for service and a carhop will kindly assist you. The menu is replete with drive-in staples such as several varieties of burgers, fries and the like. But when you make a beverage choice, it must be the legendary root beer, which they make themselves. The dark draft has a thick, Guinness-like head, and with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, it's weighty enough to be a meal in itself. If you still have room, have another.