The Mozzarella Company's whole-milk mozzarella gives the gunk sold in grocery stores a really bad name. The company, located in Deep Ellum, is celebrating 20 years of making cheese. Grocery store shoppers may not generally know that the cheese that's sold in plastic bags with far-off expiration dates would hardly be called mozzarella in Italy. It would probably be called spoiled. The Mozzarella Company's whole-milk mozzarella is so creamy, pliable and delicious you may want to consider a helping even if you're severely lactose intolerant. Just saying, it wouldn't be a bad way to go. Besides mozzarella, the company sells cream cheese, ricotta, goat cheese and many others. Cheeses, not goats.

This inconspicuous little shop on Preston Road in far North Dallas could pass easily for just another nursery or patio furniture store, but it's what's inside that makes this hidden jewel shine. Beyond the aisle upon aisle of clay chimeneas and farther past the piles of imports ranging in origin from China to the Ivory Coast is a family restaurant serving up some of the best desserts, coffees and chicken salad in town. The Obzeet Restaurant and Tropical Bar is hidden behind rows of fine imported statues and artifacts but defines itself by being one of the most unique dining experiences in Dallas. With a menu that consists of soups, sandwiches and cigars, how can you go wrong? But none of that endears it more than its pies, cakes and other confections. Obzeet is great for a late lunch after a day spent buried among the ordinary.

Dallas doesn't have a Chinatown. It has a Koreatown. And there's a Cowtown to the left. But no Chinatown, no parades with dragons and firecrackers. Perhaps that's why most Chinese cuisine in Dallas is forgettable: heavy, dry, greasy and sticky--with dumb fortunes. Chef Hsu busts that mold with a fat bronze Buddha (they have a nice collection on the bar). Chef Hsu features lithe treatments of the old standard retreads: kung pao chicken, Mongolian beef, sweet and sour pork. Then it goes on a rampage of Chinese exotica with braised sea cucumbers with pork belly, various versions of stewed and braised shark's fin and shredded jellyfish salad among others, all impeccably prepared with an eye on clarity and a palate sensitive to intrinsic flavors. Plus they have a large live lobster and crab tank for the kids, and buffet tables the size of container freighters for the value-minded. Dumb fortunes, too.

Somewhere between Mi Piaci and Chef Boyardee lies the concept of the family Italian restaurant, which is best exemplified by Café Amore in Richardson. Mama makes the tomato sauce, which is sweet, satisfying but never heavy; Papa flings the pizza dough, which makes "Ray's Original" New York pizza seem, to put it mildly, unoriginal. Their friendly bambinos wait on the hungry crowds, chilling kids with fresh hot bread and little cups of shredded mozzarella (upon request) as they wait for authentic homemade pastas, pizzas and subs, all at prices so reasonable you feel as though you should be eating in your car. So what if the family is actually Albanian? The dishes are always hot, fresh, generous and cooked to order. Try the linguini with red clam sauce--which has never failed us. Never.

How bagels lost their Jewish ethnicity and became the breakfast bread of Americans from Mississippi to Maine has less to do with assimilation than it does with marketing. But we suggest that it's time for another Jewish bread to become the next crossover cuisine, even though it is more ceremonial in nature (part of the blessing before Jewish feasts) than its distant cousin, the bagel. Clearly, you don't have to be Jewish to enjoy challah: The multi-ethnic appeal of challah is obvious during any Jewish celebration (weddings, bar mitzvahs) where gentiles are in attendance. And why not? The egg bread is sweet, fluffy, great plain or with butter. And no one makes it better than Empire Baking Company, which understands that good challah needs just the right consistency--not so airy that it's all crust and no dough, and not so doughy that it can double as a doorstop. Empire's crust and dough are in perfect harmony.

Without a doubt, Kuby's has always been the best of the wurst--the best bratwurst, knockwurst, even bloodwurst, if you're gutsy enough to try it. But their vast array of meats goes beyond sausage and incorporates some of the choicest cuts of beef found this side of the Rhine. Try the tenderloin, the T-bone, the sirloin strip--all cued up and displayed with Teutonic exactitude. But if you really want to savor the saturated fat that is Kuby's, let them smoke you a large turkey for the holiday season. Artfully sliced and plentiful, you will be eating turkey sandwiches well into the new year. And you will enjoy it!

This category makes us hearken to our own salad days when Mom made the best damn chicken salad this side of the Ukraine. That is why we set the bar so high for this category and why we sampled way too much chicken salad. But in our quest for the best, we have come to one unalterable conclusion: It ain't just chicken and mayo no more. There's a whole bunch of stuff going on. The chicken is chunky as well as smooth, and it is mixed with apples, apricots, grapes, nuts, mushrooms, honey, eggs, tarragon, curry--more spices than you can pull off a rack. And although Two Sisters Catering Company gave Whole Foods a serious run for its money (yes, we also sampled Central Market), the simplicity and overall good taste of Whole Foods' "classic chicken salad" just hit too close to home for us to pass up.

A Dallas institution, Keller's offers a hamburger dining experience like none other. The drive-in joint, in all its tattered glory, conjures up Happy Days memories with a grown-up twist. On a recent weekday evening, a line of cars formed in the drive-thru, where six-packs of Coors Light were the item du jour. Oh, and its hamburger is pretty good, too. Cooked to order, the modest patty comes with pickles, tomatoes and onions on a lightly grilled sesame seed bun. The price is old-fashioned, too: just $2.05. Add 20 cents for cheese.

Gone are the days when fast-food fare was simply the likes of Burger King and Sonic. Right alongside them are restaurants that fall into the "quick casual" genre and whip out dishes with the same attention to speed offered by their more downscale culinary cousins. Enter Tin Star and Baja Fresh and Masala Wok, and you will find food that hurries as well as tastes good. Pei Wei Asian Diner, the P.F. Chang spin-off, gets our vote in this category. They do up rice bowls and noodle dishes right, offering them at modest prices and with enough haste to make dinner and a movie a reality instead of an ideal. Orange slices accompanying green iced tea, napkins thick enough to withstand the strain of a meal, an open kitchen and a sleek décor are the kinds of touches that make the capacity crowds here willing to slow down and actually chew their food.

The traditional South Indian, all-vegetarian restaurant offers a lunchtime buffet that stretches the width of the restaurant, with both sides of the long, heated serving table offering dishes to sample as you circle it. This industrial utopia offers standard buffet items such as fruit and vegetable salads, and the ethnic dishes are thoughtfully labeled. But, more important, the trays are always hot, fresh and filled with an array of vegetables, soups, nan and rice, with standards such as curried vegetables finding room along items such as a coconut and veggie salsa. In addition, a crepe filled with potatoes and peas is brought to the table in either spicy or regular versions.