Anyone who's spent any significant amount of time in Durham knows that we appreciate the finer things in life. We might be the Bull City, but we have rather discerning palettes when it comes to food and drink.

And let's be clear -- the finer things don't have to be the expensive things or cliched things or even trendy things. Often, the finest things are simple, local and comforting.

Like beer. I'm not a big beer drinker, but I know that Durham is home to the area's only brewery, Triangle Brewing Company, and you're hard pressed to find a local restaurant, dive and gourmet alike that doesn't have one of their white Belgians on tap these days.

And burritos. Gourmet magazine wrote about the Hispanic food Mecca that we simply know as Roxboro Road in September of 2007, and I hope it prompted formerly intimidated non-Hispanics to brave a Spanish menu to taste la comida autentica of Super Taquer'a and Los Comales.

Our cafes sell Counter Culture Coffee, fair-trade, organic and sustainably grown beans brought in from all over the world and roasted on Alston Avenue. Our barbecue joints sell pork pulled from a pig that likely spent a happy life within a 50-mile radius. Our bistros -- yes, we have bistros now -- serve cheese plates with chevre made from local goats and ice cream from local cows.

You can have a mortadella panini at Toast, walk around the corner to the downtown Locopops for dessert (the coffee-orange-date popsicle has so far been my favorite), and finish up with a cafe au lait at Rue Cler. Or you can grab a burrito at Cosmic Cantina and top it off with a killer blondie at Francesca's, then walk them both off around the East Campus wall.

And for those with the means to spend some quality money on quality grub, Durham is home to Magnolia Grill -- ranked 11th best restaurant in the nation a few years ago by Gourmet.

Those mainstays will soon be joined by a number of new restaurants that are opening downtown this spring -- chefs are lured by Durham's unpretentious charm and understand that we can appreciate an understated shrimp-and-grits brunch as well as the frivolity of truffle butter atop a New York strip.

Our restaurants started offering seasonal menus using local farmers long before it was hip to do so, and this practice was acknowledged by Bon Appetit last year when it named the Durham-Chapel Hill area the foodiest small town in America.

But we don't need validation from national publications to know Durham is home to fantastic food, farmers and restaurateurs. We're Durham, and we've been contentedly flying under the radar for quite some time, thank you very much.

So, for The Durham News' first food column, here is a list of February food events. If I missed something, my apologies. Please send along anything you think is food-relevant to me, Elizabeth Shestak, at eshestak@mac.com.

Tell me about dives out on highways 70 and 98, perky cafes in unassuming strip malls, and anything else you can think of. This column is going to be as organic as the collards I buy at the farmers' market all summer -- we'll see how it shapes up. I'm open to anything: home recipes, farming tips, new restaurants, anything. And I know the rest of Durham is, too.