Since Seven Days held the first Vermont Restaurant Week in 2010, a spate of similar shindigs have sprung up around the region — including weeklong events in New Hampshire, Killington and now, Manchester.

This is clearly a welcome phenomenon for those of us who live to eat. Usually scheduled to coincide with slower times of year — i.e., mud season and stick season — restaurant weeks offer perfect windows during which to chow down at places hitherto unknown to the people of this area (to quote Frank Zappa).

At least a dozen restaurants are taking part in Manchester's first Restaurant Week, offering three-course, prix-fixe meals that cost $20.12 at lunch (clever) and $30.12 for dinner. For those who've never ventured there, the town is a food mecca, a liminal zone where top Vermont ingredients collide with the polished, classical techniques expected by tourists from points south. As far as I can tell, stick season is the only reason that some of the dining rooms in Manchester appeared half-empty last night, at least from the road; the two meals (!) I ate there were both spectacular, albeit in different ways. 

Earlier this month, Gretel-Anne Fischer teased on the Facebook page for her Winooski bakery, Cupp's, that she'd soon have a big announcement. "Any ideas on where [I've] been the past 7 weeks?" she wrote. "We can't spill the beans yet but once we do HOLY COW it's HUGE!!!!!"

Well, consider the beans spilled. On November 26, Fischer will make her national television debut as a contestant on TLC's "Next Great Baker."

144 Church St., Burlington, 448-3155

Many restaurants were closed last night in anticipation of Sandy, but when I called Mr. Crêpe to see if they were serving, the young lady on the phone assured me, "We're not afraid of hurricanes here."

Very well. To Church Street I went, the wind blowing and the streets zombie-apocalypse empty.

Clean, modern and bright, the interior of Mr. Crêpe felt like the perfect antidote to the dark doings outside.

The prices at Mr. Crêpe can be astonishingly low, and even in the foreboding weather, several college-aged diners were digging in.

Hurricane Sandy spared Vermont from the worst of its wrath, but some of us are still without power. So, what do you do when all you have in the refrigerator — cheeses, lettuce, cucumber, radicchio, scallions, chicken thighs — needs to be eaten tout de suite?

My Oklahoma-born, tornado-bred grandfather had a simple solution for times such as this: Vienna Sausage and Schlitz. He once rode out a days-long wildfire this way, shut up tight in his trailer and resisting all efforts to evacuate.

He would probably grimace at my own au courant storm ideas — sear the radicchio, then melt Spring Brook Farm Raclette on top by shoving underneath my propane stove? Marinate the chicken thighs in orange juice, ginger and soy, then grill them? Others of my ilk prepared for Sandy, too. Seven Days multimedia producer Eva Sollberger made an epic-looking mushroom stroganoff, while Kathryn Vanderminden, a chef who runs Village Roots Catering in Pawlet, put together "a really big crockpot of venison stew with lots of veggies and potatoes." She's also blessed with a fully gas stove, she says, so she can roast squash throughout the week.

Last week I undertook the brutal, grueling task of pairing local hard ciders with creamy, unctuous local cheeses. Just when I thought my stomach had recovered, I was invited to a cider pairing dinner at the North Hero House Inn & Restaurant on the Champlain Islands. It sounded too unique to pass up.

If last week's exercise taught me how well cider plays with cheese, last night's dinner schooled me in two more things: The hard, and even the sweet, stuff works equally well with savory dishes, and there's a seriously talented chef lurking inside the North Hero House. Last April, chef Tim McQuinn — who cut his teeth at Boston's Craigie On Main — joined the team here. (Even longer ago, McQuinn was a Paul Smith's College alum; one of his mentors, former NECI vice president and current consultant Paul Sorgule, was at last night's dinner.)

150 Dorset Street, South Burlington, 448-3525

The Blue Mall hasn't had the best luck as a culinary destination. Though Wings Over Burlington has the best tenders around, and Outback Steakhouse has a steady clientele of people I've apparently never met, restaurants such as Nothing but Noodles and Erics' Place seem to have come and gone quickly. The excellent natural foods spot, Moon Meadow Market, is long gone, and Vermont Sandwich Company has also closed.

But last month, a new hope came to the mall: Japanese food, the only such option in South Burlington besides Koto Japanese Steakhouse on Shelburne Road.

Hana's owners previously worked at Koto, and the menu is similar, with slightly lower prices at the new restaurant. Hana also boasts some new entrees you won't find at Koto, including eel don and curry chicken. But priced between $18 and $26, the specialty entrees don't fit into the Alice Eats range.

A spate of new businesses is moving into Montpelier, into spaces owned by Montpelier Property Management. I'm sure it's welcome news to most everyone in town. Yet I've eagerly anticipated one in particular — Chill, the brand new gelato place at 32 State Street.

So I went down Tuesday to check it out. The best-laid plans: Chill is only open from Thursday to Monday, at least until spring. Through the window, I could see the gelato flavors scrawled on a chalkboard — hazelnut, stracciatella with roasted cherries, "Mint-pelier" — as well as lemon and pear-anise sorbets. Sigh. It would have to wait for another day.

Next door, fortunately, a similarly tantalizing operation is in full swing — Cocoa Bean at 40 State, which also opened a few weeks ago. Inside the airy space, the smell of chocolate layers the air, and two cases are loaded with truffles, barks, caramel-filled chocolates, pumpkin- and moose-shaped pops and free samples of glossy dark and milk chocolate leaves.

Last year, for the first time, the Vermont International Film Festival was organized thematically — and one of those themes was food. It was intended to be a one-time special, but, says executive director Orly Yadin with a laugh, "I can't keep away from food. It was really successful and we got really good feedback. This year, we found enough good films to try it again."

Yadin says that while the seven food-themed movies are all superficially focused on eating, their subject matters range from history to politics to ethnography.

When Mark Brooks set out to create a power bar thatoutdoorsy dog owners could share with their active pooches, he made aninteresting observation about interspecies cuisine. His first instinct was tobake a dog biscuit that people could eat. But that concept proved too hard toswallow, as he discovered the day he asked his teenage daughter to try one.

“She said to me, ‘Dad, I am not eating dogtreats!’” recalls Brooks. “My first reaction was to get into an argument withher. But when I thought about it, I realized, my God, she’s right!”

5247 Shelburne Road, Shelburne, 985-9877

Every once in a while, I find food so good in a space so small that I want to keep it all to myself. That's why it's taken me so long to write about Next Door Bakery & Café.

Despite its location (adjacent to its big brother, the Bearded Frog) and its pedigree (Frog pastry chef Jesse Lauer is at the helm), the quirky café has flown under the radar.

When I mention it to folks outside Shelburne, they rarely know about the spot, which opened at the end of July. But locals keep it humming. Every time I've visited, it's been bustling, but if I wait a few minutes, I'm always able to grab a table.