What you should order: food you like, that will not make you sick or smelly

What you should not order: food you don't like or food that will make you sick or smelly

See how easy that was? You're a person of dating age and you've likely been eating food in the company of other human beings for a least a couple of years now, right? Ideally without causing the people in your immediate vicinity to vomit, faint, weep or cringe?

Good. You are ready to order food on a date. Go get 'em, tiger!
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Gentlemen - dare I say your special lady friend looks just smashing tonight? She went out and got her hair and nails done, tweezed various things, squeezed herself into magical, shape-carving, circulation-repressing undergarments (that she'll discreetly remove before you ever see them), and painted on her date face. She's pretty hot.

But you, sir. Would it truly unman you to put on a tie? Maybe one without a passive-aggressive Looney Toons character or sports logo stitched uponst it? Okay, okay - that was overreaching. Might you consider dress shoes? Perhaps something with a non-rubber sole or without a visible logo? Maybe something that covers the toe area? No?
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It's bad enough to be all dressed up with nowhere to go, let alone be all dressed up for a date who’s a no-show.

It's a dating downer that has most likely happened to you or someone you know. One party decides just not to show up - more commonly referred to as being "stood up."

It could be the woman in the corner booth whose Lemon Drop tastes more bitter with every glance at her watch. Or perhaps it's the man at the bar who loosens his tie with every check of his iPhone. Either way, not only is this a sticky situation for the person on the receiving end, it’s a potentially stickier situation for the restaurant staff witnessing it firsthand.
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One afternoon a few months ago, my husband walked into the house carrying a cookbook and then stood in the kitchen for a long time, turning the pages, reading it. This was interesting. He looked deeply absorbed.

When his cell phone rang, he went out onto the porch for a minute, the cookbook still opened on the counter, and I came over to inspect. He had been interrupted in the midst of "How to Choose a Pork Roast." There was a silhouette of a pig, connected by arrows to detailed line drawings of 13 hefty-looking cuts of raw meat.
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Four and a half years ago, my husband Douglas and I plighted our troth with infinitely less fanfare, but arguably as much ardor as the couple slated to take the royal plunge on Friday.

Little of our ceremony was traditional. I wore 64 yards of red tulle with black flames climbing up it and our Irish Wolfhound escorted me down the aisle. My groom had drawn heavily upon his theater tech and direction background to light, score and choreograph the proceedings - not to mention spending well over a decade converting the deconsecrated Episcopal church itself into our home.

The ceremony was highly reflective of who we are as individuals and as a united force - all the way down to the readings. One dear friend selected a Frank O'Hara poem, my father gave a speech on the importance of ethics in a marriage, a friend and sister shared passages from Jane Eyre and then one of the finest food writers in the country instructed us eat cheese together.
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Spring is the season for new beginnings and budding romances. There are couples canoodling as they dine alfresco outside restaurants everywhere. You can practically smell the sizzling steaks as you stroll down the street. And you can't walk in the park without stumbling on a romantic picnic.

Spring is all about dining in the great outdoors. It's about love and it's about barbecue sauce.

As someone who has dated any number of men who make Al Bundy look like Mario Batali, I should know. My dyspeptic dating disasters inspired me to conduct a study of the male species via their stomachs. I interviewed more than 200 men and women about the connection between a man's wining and dining style and his mating style. I discovered you can divine a man's essence from his culinary style.

Read the rest of "Pick a man by his winning culinary style" on CNN Living.

In response to our lunchtime poll about restaurant breakups:

I've broken up with my boyfriend before at Chima, a Brazilian BBQ Buffet. It was really awkward because as I was telling the boy about why we weren't compatible as a couple, the servers kept coming up to us with skewers of meat, breaking my momentum with each interruption.

By the end of the meal, I had offered to pay since I was doing the breaking up, but the guy (with tears in his eyes) said the least he could do was pay for the meal. I think it was really embarrassing for him because we could hear the waiters whispering about us and at this point it was pretty obvious that he was crying.

As we walked outside and waited for a cab, he addressed some of my concerns and agreed to try to work it out instead of abruptly ending our relationship. 3 years later, we're still together but haven't been back to Chima - Julia

"So, when you said just a few minutes ago that you love me, you were LYING TO ME?!?"

I tried not to eavesdrop - at first. My back was to the troubled couple and in the mostly empty dining room, absent a dining companion of my own, there was nothing to buffer the breakup. I'd been feeling sorry for myself. A weekend frolic with my husband in New Orleans was thwarted by sudden emergency surgery for one of our dogs. Not only did he have to stay put in Brooklyn - I couldn't get back to be with my family because exorbitant change fees atop an $1173 vet bill was economically unfeasible.

At least I wasn't getting dumped at a restaurant.
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Paula Deen was in the building taping Saturday's episode of Your $$$$$ (1 p.m. ET), so we just followed the wafting scent of butter 'til we found her and captured her on our Flip Cam.

There's plenty more to come, including her plea of innocence on the charge of "butter crimes" and why Frank Stitt oughta "shut up" on the topic of shrimp 'n grits, but for now, here's her take on why the most "romantical" meal includes "bone sucking."

Editor's note: all week, CNN Newsroom, Rick's List and Eatocracy are teaming up to take a look the effects our dining choices have on our minds, bodies and wallets. Tune into CNN Newsroom daily from 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. ET for on-air coverage and join in the discussion here on Eatocracy. ALL COVERAGE

Sara Leeder is a producer on The Cafferty File.

“Hi, honey. I’m home. What’s for dinner?”

Ok, maybe I don’t always say “honey,” but most nights when walking through the door at 7:30, I do ask what’s for dinner. My husband and I both work full-time jobs and we both take care of our toddler son, but my husband gets home from work a couple of hours earlier than I do. This means that if we’re going to eat a home-cooked meal, he will be the one slaving over the hot stove. As it turns out my husband is part of a growing group of men who are doing the cooking. Some of them are so into it, they’re called “gastrosexuals.”

When we started dating, I used to joke with my him that I was the only one who ever did any cooking. Well, not anymore. Two to three nights a week he’s the one sautéing, slicing and dicing. And he’s not half bad either.
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