Eva and I were in Dallas a few weeks ago and stopped at Jimmy's Italian Market to load up on wonderful Italian cheese, lots of different salami and their homemade Italian sausage links.

Next door to Jimmy's is the "hole-in-the-wall" gourmet vegetable and fruit shop Spiceman’s F.M. 1410 of Tom Spicer. Tom searches the world for unique veggies and fruits for the chefs of Dallas and other's that appreciate good food. This year, he also started a chef's garden at the Mansion on Turtle Creek.

We tasted some very unique mushrooms including Lobster which has the color and texture of lobster meat and a similar taste. I think they were from Mexico. He also had Salicornia (aka sea beans) which were really different. It is a plant growing on the west coast that takes in the sea salt giving it a very distinct flavor.

In addition to his produce shop, Tom is an accomplished musician and plays the Dallas music scene.

Tom has helped us out when we had a surplus of blackberries and blueberries. If we can ever hire or partner with someone that likes to garden of a large scale, Tom has lots of needs that we could fill.