If it is possible to have a food hangover, that is definitely what I’m experiencing this morning. Mr. Eats and I celebrated our anniversary last night at Iron Fork. It may seem odd, but it’s such a fun event that it makes perfect sense for us. We do love food. Lots of food. Plus, the proceeds from the event benefit Second Harvest Food Bank, a wonderful and worthy organization. This year, the event was held at Marathon Music Works, which I think is now my favorite of all the venues. It was much easier to see the chefs at work, and there was a good amount of room to get to the vendors’ tables.

And two very large and well-staffed bars, which is, of course, very important.

UPDATE: We have our winner! Thanks for playing, everyone. A little birdie told me there might be another chance to win tomorrow. Check @BitesBlog on Twitter or the Scene Facebook page.

The 2012 edition of Iron Fork — Nashville's best culinary showcase/showdown — is just days away, and if you don't have a ticket already, here's the chance for you (and a friend) to go for free, courtesy of Bites.

Winning this contest is as easy as leaving a comment, but you have to do it before 4:30 p.m. today. We'll choose the funniest caption then, and notify the winner via email. Go!

As promised, my little group of Luncheros has been nibbling our way around town trying some of the best fish and chips searching for the creme de la cod. Did I mention that this group usually consists of me and three to four attractive young female food bloggers. "My name is Charlie, and these are my angels."

Occasionally another dude crashes the party, and his attendance is always welcome since he tells us stories about the stars that cannot be repeated in this space. But the core group of four of us are serious about our task of finding the best fish and chips in town. However, we're not serious about much else, so the lunch conversation is always lively.

So here are the results of rounds 1 to 3:

Dan McGuinness Pub
1538 Demonbreun St.
(615) 252-1991

All of us had tried the fish and chips at Dan McGuinness previously, and with easily accessible parking and the benefit of a $6 Thursday special, it was a logical spot to start our investigations. The lunch deal included two large fillets and arrived within five minutes of our ordering, despite the fact that there were lots of other diners there to take advantage of the cheap eats. Instead of the expected thick-cut "chips," the fish came accompanied by seasoned french fries, which were in fact nicely seasoned. Also well-spiced was the batter on the fish, and that added a nice counterpoint when lightly doused with malt vinegar — as God intended.

The tartar sauce was deemed to be a little bit sweet and lacking in the pickle relish department. There was a random sprinkling of parsley all over the dish, so maybe it missed the tartar sauce bowl during prep. Overall, the Luncheros considered Dan McGuinness a strong offering, especially for the price on Thursdays. Taking the price into account, we gave it an average score of 4.125 fillets out of a possible 5.

The trend toward house-made potato chips gets my vote. Whether they're cooked crisp or still slightly chewy, the deep browning gives an extra layer of flavor, with plenty of hefty crunch. Each batch seems to have a couple of thicker-cut chips that still have some chew to them toward the center, which is a whole other pleasure.

Cut thin and properly cooked, they're great plain, as served to a lunch group recently at Fleet Street, a reminder of how good potato chips can be. Maybe a bit of seasoning — the truffled potato chips at Cha Chah are just the thing with a cocktail. And they're also great jazzed up, as served to a dinner crowd at Yolos. Dolloped with with sour cream and sprinkled with bacon, green onions and blue cheese, these chips rose to the level of appetizer rather than snack.

Homemade potato chips are so innately good that it's hard to pinpoint the best in town. But let's try — where have you had some incredible homemade chips?

Recently Southern Living magazine launched a Comfort Food Cook-Off, asking 10 Southern chefs to come up with recipes for classic comfort foods to share with their readers. Then they matched up the chefs and their recipes against another regional restaurant and challenged both to actually put the item on their menu, to the delight of their patrons. Finally, the two versions of the same dish were matched up online in a sort of Southern Smackdown.

Locally, Chef Tyler Brown of the Capitol Grille was asked to challenge Chef David Bull of Second Bar + Kitchen in Austin, Texas. Brown's Country Fried Steak and Uncle Ellis Cornmeal Gravy (pictured right) are competing against Bull's Chicken Fried Steak and Red Eye Gravy. But really, where's the competition in that? Tyler's steak and his sous chef Cole Ellis' family recipe for white gravy — versus some Texan trying to pour old coffee on a rib-eye? Pshaw.

Plus, Chef Bull's version takes more than twice as long to prepare. You could have made Tyler's dish, eaten it, done the dishes and be a quarter of the way through watching the Texas Longhorns lose another college football game by the time that Texas shoe leather was ready to gnaw.

So if you want to see the winning recipe (IMHO), visit the Southern Living website here for the steak and here for Cole's gravy recipe. If you must attempt to compare Chef Bull's his valiant effort is here.

I have a regular "lunch bunch" of four or five people, including some Bites commenters. A couple times a week, one of us will send up the Bat Signal on Twitter or via text message to see who's up for a midday meal. And then the bickering begins as we try to decide on a place that fits within our respective lunch specials and is at least marginally interesting. Unless somebody plays the Smiling Elephant card — we're all always up for a trip to the Happy Pachyderm.

Recently, one of our ringleaders expressed a craving for some good fish and chips. That started quite a debate as to whether such a thing actually exists in our fair burg and where we should go in our attempt to find some. Each of us had our own opinion, so we agreed to add a regular fish and chip trial to our lunch rotation. The initial recommendations are McNamara's, Batter'd and Fried, Dan McGuinness, Fleet Street and Whiskey Kitchen.

Of course, not only can we not agree on who has the best fish and chips in town, we also can't even agree on the criteria to judge them by. Do they have to be authentically British? Should hot fish be considered? With or without malt vinegar?

You probably walk right past the tomatoes in the supermarket this time of year, and if you think of them at all, it's likely to wonder who buys tomatoes this time of year.

The answer is "the restaurant industry." That's one of the important points of Tomatoland, an informative and somewhat distressing book on industrial tomato production that Bites reported on this summer.

The sub-optimal tomatoes grown in unsustainable ways detailed in the book are knee-jerk year-round additions to burgers and sandwiches, on salad bars, and as garnishes. While tomatoes are integral to some foods (like tabouli), in others, the tomato is there as a spot of red and a touch of sweet-tart.

I asked some local chefs to reimagine winter alternatives to the out-of-season tomato for garnishes sandwiches, burgers and salads.

Martha Stamps of marthastampscatering.com: "I stopped serving 'fresh' tomatoes out of season when I was at The Corner Market. Any tender veggies, like cucumber, squash, avocado, jicama, radishes — are good. Also pickles — okra, peppers, beets, turnips. Lastly, fruit (tomatoes are one, you know!) — sliced mango, pineapple, under-ripe papaya, apples, pears.

Laura WIlson of Nashville Farmers' Market Grow Local Kitchen, formerly of Ombi and The Turnip Truck: "I used to put up a tomato conserve in the fall with bumper crop tomatoes and serve them on Ombi burgers in the winter."

And Brandon Frohne, formerly chef and urban gardener at Park Manor, now packed off to Atlanta and working at West Egg worked up a cherry-infused black raspberry ketchup for burgers.

Pickled vegetables, relishes, tangy fruit, cranberry ketchup. Seriously, who needs "fresh" tomatoes this time of year?

There are seven ingredients in the perfect cornbread recipe and none of them is sugar.

We've had this discussion before — in this part of the South, cornbread is hot, salty and greasy.

I've defended that principle for years, but last week, a cold, sweet, fluffy muffin was just the thing at B&C Market BBQ inside the Nashville Farmers' Market house.

Lunch was B&C beef brisket, cut into both thin and thick slices. Each slice had crusty bark outside and a smoke ring inside. Long past the lunch rush, the beef was still admirably moist, which isn't always the case with brisket, even when it's fresh off the fire.

Teams are still forming, and conjuring their stewing skills, for the second annual Music City Chili Cook-Off on Oct. 15.

Bites frequenters Erin of Erins Food Files and Vivek Surti of Vivek's Epicurean Adventures are both entering as competitors. (Erin's got a secret ingredient.) Vegetarian restaurant The Wild Cow is a competitor, too.

Judging is by popular vote — your paid entry fee buys you five voting chits. Spread your votes around or be strategic and just chuck them into your buddy's tin.

Vietti Chili, our homegrown, longtime local chili, is a sponsor — nice to see them in that role. Ole Smoky Tennessee Whiskey, the first legal moonshine distiller int he state, is also sponsoring. They'll be serving shots of their Apple Pie moonshine in the beer garden, with Yazoo providing the beer.

Brother Z's Wangs will be serving wings and hot dogs, and Maggie Moo's mobile slab will sell ice cream. And for something completely different, The Breakfast Truck will be peddling its fare.

The other day, a fellow walked into the Scene offices wielding a shrink-wrapped 8-ounce slab of Walker Creek Toffee and introduced himself as Bruce Mott, one of the people who make the stuff by hand out in Alexandria, Tenn., for a few months a year. It didn't take him long to throw down the gauntlet — two of them, actually.

First, Mott said he was itching for a "toffee smack-down" pitting the Nashville area's top toffee-makers against each other to determine sweet, salty supremacy. Second — implying that he felt pretty good about Walker Creek's chances should such a buttery, crunchy battle royale materialize — he said, indicating the aforementioned 8-ounce slab with a subtle nod of his head, "I think it's the best in the world."

We don't hear the phrase "best in the world" thrown around too often — at least not in the confections department — but not wanting to let that kind of assertion go uneaten, I gathered up the Scene staff and asked them to taste-test Mott's claim. Here are some of the notes I was able to write down between breaking off more pieces for myself: