Some out of town friends stopped by last night to drop off a bottle of Sierra Nevada Red and watch me walk around on my new hip.

A glass of their excellent wine went into a chicken pot I had going, and then my wife Joselyn and I drank some with dinner. Then we discovered the wine went well with left-over chocolate chips and election results, so we pretty much killed the rest of the bottle.

I report this charming but rather ordinary culinary episode because I've been reading new cookbooks and watching the food channel, and I'm inspired to cook, and drink, and drive.

I have now cooked drunken chicken and drunk red wine. I hope one day to drive through Italy in a restored VW van like TV's Jamie Oliver. I do what I'm told.

Give me a wrinkled green pepper, some boxed couscous inexplicably left in the back of the fridge by house guests, a couple of mushrooms, some olives and a tomato and I'll create dinner for two in a half hour or less. After a hard day's work we'll eat anything hot in a bowl.

For further inspiration over the years we've come to rely on local restauranteur Margaret Fox's three cookbooks: Café Beaujolais, Morning Food," and Evening Food.

It turns out that Margaret (I call her that, because we are friends) also cooks Refrigerator Surprise. "On the rare occasions when home-cooking happened during my Beaujolais years, provisions were assembled after a quick trip to the restaurant's walk-in refrigerator..."

"I would think, 'Oh, there are tomatoes, and there's some feta, and there are some olives, and some cilantro -- what else sounds good? Lemons. Grated lemon peel, perhaps, for zing. What about the capers? No, too much.' And suddenly there was an omelette filling."

In the Introduction to her newly revised cookbook, Morning Food, she recalls a magazine feature "profiling the contents of a chef's home refrigerator. What was revealed was a sorry assortment of sour milk, moldy cheese, and a flaccid carrot to round out the food groups. (Margaret) read that article ruefully, recognizing a kindred soul."

Local foodies will rejoice that Margaret Fox now has updated her Morning Food cookbook even though she long ago sold her restaurant. "Working on the new edition has brought back what I loved most about those years at Café Beaujolais," she writes.

I was delighted to discover that she has taken at least one classic recipe from her original and currently out-of-print Café Beaujolais cookbook, slightly updated it, and inserted it into the new Morning Food. Joselyn and I have cooked her Black Bean Chile so many times that the original hardcover falls open to the page and the spine has broken in just that spot.

Margaret has cut back on the jalapenos "but if you like a really spicy chili, by all means, add more." "Two finely chopped onions" has become "two cups finely chopped yellow onions." We're a bit more precise, aren't we, but it's the same satisfying recipe.

Back when Mendocino's Café Beaujolais pioneered the idea of chili in the morning it was a startling innovation. Nowadays many California restaurants serve black bean burritos and other variations for breakfast. But Margaret was the first, and she is the one who stunned Julia Child with this dish.

As Margaret said in the first edition, "We don't serve breakfasts, we serve Morning Food." This concept gives you permission to use any ingredients at all, and serve them in the morning.

"You are eating exactly the same ingredients that other people ALWAYS eat for breakfast... put together in a different way," she writes.

Now I am ready once again to try a Banana-Pecan Pineapple Ice Cream Waffle Sundae, Persian Eggs, Pesto, Mushroom & Cheese Strata, and so much more.

Yumm!

Aired Sunday November 12, 2006 at 10:55 am and Wednesday November 15, 2006 at 1:00 pm

Orders/Information:

All three of Margaret Fox's previous cookbooks are currently out of print and likely to stay that way. You can find them as used or collectible books ranging in price from $1.86 to more than sixty dollars. Try www.addall.com or used.addall.com/Used/ if you'd like to do your own research.

Morning Food: Breakfasts, Brunches & More for Savoring the Best Part of the Day by Margaret S. Fox and John B. Bear. Ten Speed Press paperback $19.95. ISBN 1580087825. Nicely illustrated with excellent food photography by Laurie Smith.

It was a bottle of Black Oak 2003 Sierra Foothills Black Oak Five, estate bottled. 50% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Merlot, 14% Cabernet Franc, 8% Malbec, and 6% Petit Verdot. Grown, produced and bottled in Auburn, California. Thanks again to Hal and Susan Holding for this delightful drink.