The Storm Gourmet is coming!

We can't wait to taste the delicacies Daphne Nikolopoulos has in store for us when she visits St. Pete Sept. 9 to demonstrate her techniques for turning out great dinners when the power is out.

Daphne wrote The Storm Gourmet to help us all eat well when those nasty storms take their toll on the local utilities. Daphne's view is that with a little planning the inconvenience of living by candlelight and flashlights and camp lanterns needn't mean that we have to eat out of cans. If we don't get a direct hit on Tampa Bay and end up with Pinellas as an island, we'll be all set.

Anyway, Daphne will be here to share her secrets in September. We're partnering with our friends at the Pier Aquarium to bring you Daphne's presentation. She and her husband and baby will be coming over from Palm Beach, where Daphne's day job is editor of Palm Beach Illustrated, the slick monthly journal that chronicles the lives and times of some of the country's wealthiest people who inhabit that stretch of East Coast real estate. (I haven't asked if Daphne and our friend and former colleague Casey O'Connor have crossed paths. He settled in Palm Beach, too, after he left the employ of The Orlando Sentinel low these many years ago. Wouldn't surprise me a bit if they've met. Palm Beach isn't that big a town, and the journalistic coummunity is smaller still.)

More about Daphne as we get closer to the event. Mark it on your calendar. September 9. 11 a.m. The St. Pete Pier Aquarium.