Matt Janke celebrated his 47th birthday on June 27, 2007 with the debut of his Market restaurant's much-anticipated expansion. I had the great good fortune of being there, happily (and anonymously) celebrating with him, and later reporting the event in my column.

Today I stopped into Matt's for lunch and got what I came for: a fabulous pan-fried catfish sandwich and confirmation that the news I'd just heard -- that Matt's business-partner Dan Bugge now owned the restaurant and Matt was no longer in the house -- was, indeed, true.

Reporter Ron Lieber provided a great read -- and some savvy food-shopping tips -- in a "Your Money" column that appeared last weekend in the New York Times. For the record, the best food-shopping tip I ever got came my way a couple of years ago when I was gnashing my teeth at the supermarket while trying to open a plastic produce-bag. I was cursing those unyeilding rolls found in every grocer's produce aisle when a woman squeezing the avocados beside me said, "Here, try this." I watched as she wet her fingers on some damp produce, grabbed the plastic bag I was angsting over and -- voila! -- open sesame.

Got any food-shopping tips you want to share? Let me have 'em.

I got an e-mail from John Hom of Kirkland, who works in the Chinatown-International District, alerting me to the sale of his favorite Chinese restaurant, Harbor City. I thought it was a beautiful eulogy for the restaurant, and a lovely honor for the Ngo family -- who apparently ran the place with love and care.

John noted that Harbor City is slated to reopen with the same name under new ownership in a month or so, and I'm sorry to say (after reading his e-mail, and this post from those ID-lunch fanatics at MSG150) that I only ate there once. It was too long ago to recall the details, but I'll leave those to John, whose emotional ties to the place clearly run deep. He writes: