am i the only person who can remember what they ate on holiday more vividly than the places? admittedly I was only 17 touring Europe but the cathedrals, mountains, etc. have all blurred together but the fresh tomato salad in Yugoslavia with olive oil and fresh basil stays on my tongue to this day, as do the first really fresh peaches I ever ate - in Padua, with the juice running down my chin (oh I think I saw a basilica there also!!)

Had an incredible meal in San Remo, Italy, at a little house that had been made into a restaurant, looking over the Med. Sea. Courses went on and on all afternoon, wine was flowing, and it was absolutely the best. We'll never forget it!

Dinner with my husband's cousin and her husband in a restaurant on Raining's Stairs in Inverness, Scotland -- my first taste of venison, good wine, romantic location and great company. It was 16 years ago and I can still taste it!

On our honeymoon by train we went to the TIC somewhere in Italy - I think in San Benedetto - and asked for a good value restaurant amongst other things. The lady was obviously used to backpackers looking for the cheapest food, so she told us to go to the railworkers lunch cafe instead of more touristy restaurants. We followed her directions through an industrial area and wondered what we were going to find.<BR><BR>Suddenly there was this clean and modern establishment, quite like any self-service lunch restaurant in some Scandinavian office building. Only the food was very different. We had pasta and then a cold plate with cheese and meat and fruit as a main dish. It was the first time I saw wine packed like milk or juice instead of a bottle.<BR> <BR>This was 1988. The meal was very good - and cheap indeed, so it did turn out to be really good value. Nothing wrong with the wine either.<BR><BR>I just wonder if these cafes still exist somewhere behind every Italian railway station. Anyone ever been to one? Maybe not.<BR><BR>You can believe everybody in the cafe stared at us; two young Finns must have been very out of place there. And neither the "dinner lady" or the rail workers spoke English, but that was no problem for us.

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