When Todd Ginsberg graduated from The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., he wanted a career in fine dining. 


And he got one. He cooked at the much-lauded Dining Room at the Ritz-Carlton in Atlanta and went on to work for Alain Ducasse in New York and at Lucas Carton in Paris. As chef of Asher restaurant in Roswell, Ga., he picked up a AAA four-diamond award.


But along the way his plan to work in fine-dining changed.


I recently returned from a vacation to London, Paris and Rome where a friend and I hit all the usual tourist spots. We spent a sunny afternoon people-watching near the Eiffel Tower, we wandered the Colosseum and the Roman Forum with the ghosts of ancient gladiators and senators, and we whizzed under London Bridge on our Thames water taxi.


And we ate.


God, did we eat.