Robin Muccari brings his curious and incisive mind to this issue as Spot Artist Extraordinaire. A close and patient observer, Robin presents graphic stories that depict a part of the world we are evidently too preoccupied to notice. In his Field Guide to Edible Foods, the de facto bible for contemporary food observation, he has not backed away from the brutalities of comestible life–a harsh note of reality. These drawings compare favorably to da Vinci's artichoke renderings and Durer's animals. We thank Robin Muccari for helping us to see.

Here's what Robin had to say about Q&As and other things:

What do you think would make people want to read these Q&As?
For Q&As in general, it can be interesting to learn about the artist who does the work. It gives them an idea of what their personality is like or what influences their work. I think these questions certainly do show my interest in food.

The Pittsburgh hoagie. Some say it's overrated. What do you say?
It is by far NOT overrated! Fools! In fact, it is much better than most subs you find in other cities. Unfortunately, there are plenty of sub/sandwich restaurants that use poor quality, soft bread and then just have practically no style to their taste. That definitely goes for your major-chain subs restaurants. The hoagie on the other hand uses good, crusty bread that is toasted to make it even better. Plus the meat and produce thrown in is quality, and it’s just a larger size sandwich altogether. Every time I go back to Pittsburgh, it’s mandatory that I get a hoagie!

It’s interesting because the hoagie is originally from Philadelphia. And from what I’ve heard from a friend who’s from there, those hoagies are not toasted. I’ve never had one, so I don’t know if that’s the only difference, but I know I like the hoagie to be toasted.

If you could invent something that would make the world a better place, what would it be & why would it be so great?
At this point in time, if I had the ability to come up with successful inventions, I would be creating projects that would help the environment and were cost efficient at the same time. Though I would probably be contradicting myself based on how I, and most people, tend to live and eat.

What is a favorite food you like to eat that most people would find weird?
A food I thought was tasty that others would most certainly not like is chicken fried bacon. That would be bacon that is breaded and seasoned the way you might chicken wings, and then cooked as though it were practically deep fried. These things sort of end up looking like thin plantains. A friend of mine and I once made them, and the two of us ate a whole pack. It was good, but it did give us some bad heartburn afterwards.

What is your stance on breakfast?
It’s definitely good to eat something in the morning, as people are always saying. Even better if it happens to be pancakes and bacon on weekends.

Fill in the blanks: The most annoying BLANK is BLANK because BLANK.
The most annoying neighbor is one who is constantly blasting music, because you can’t sleep or focus your attention on anything; you just sit there frustrated. That seriously drives me nuts. And I think in every single apartment I have lived in they have been there. Some music playing is fine, but when it’s full volume all night, not cool. I hate to sound like an old man, but you try living with neighbors like that.

If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you be & why?
No place in particular. I would just like to be traveling around, checking out different architecture, culture, environments, and food for sure. For instance, New York City: I want to go to Di Fara’s pizza on Avenue J and 15th Street in Brooklyn. Best pizza I have ever had in my life, and made only by one old man. Then I may want to go to this one restaurant in Sicily near Mount Etna that happens to have extremely good French fries. And at the same time check out the volcano.

People say you're an awesome storyteller. Why?
For some reason I end up stumbling upon strange people or events in life. I think it’s because I’ve been living in large cities, because of my interesting family, and sometimes just luck.

Here's a story for you:
Partway through college in downtown Chicago, I got a job at the school repainting the dorm rooms and hallways when most students were gone during the summer. At that time the other student painters and I became friends with Kevin, who was the building engineer of the dorms. After the job ended, I would still run into Kevin while I was living in that dorm and ask how things were going, but not really have long conversations.

In my last year of college there was a problem with the water in my dorm room bathroom, so of course Kevin showed up to repair it. While he was there, he saw that I had a Polar Bear Club T-shirt and thought that it was the most amazing thing after I told him I had joined the club that New Year’s Day when I dove in the ocean at Coney Island. At that point, he was so excited that he asked me if I want to go cross dropping with him and his friends on St. Patrick’s Day, also mentioning that he had a yacht. I had no idea what cross dropping was, but it sounded so cool to me that I agreed. When it got closer to St. Patrick’s Day, he dropped off a flier with his phone number, saying to call him on the holiday’s morning if still interested.

St Patrick’s Day morning: I called Kevin and asked if I could still come along and bring a friend of mine. He sort of released a “Well, yeah? The more the merrier!” and said that he’d pick us up in the alley behind the school’s dorms. My friend Matt and I were still unsure what cross dropping could be but went down there anyway, and around came a blue pickup truck with Kevin standing in the back. It was interesting because when I would see Kevin around the dorms, he was usually very shy and wouldn’t really look at you when he was talking, but during this he was pounding on the roof of his truck and yelling at his friends that they were driving in the wrong way. And at the same time, his friends were videotaping everything, asking Matt and me our names, but then jokingly refusing to say their own. This of course made us wonder what in the heck we had gotten ourselves into, especially in the downtown area of the city.

We finally stopped as we pulled in to another alley, this time under Wacker Drive right next to the Chicago River. When Matt and I got out of the truck, we each were immediately handed a hammer and a chisel, and Kevin opened the back of the truck, showing something in large fiberglass molding. We had to be careful what we hit, but all of us just started pounding nonstop with the chisels.

Eventually we had broken enough off that Kevin finally explained to Matt and me that we were about to throw this large piece of orange-colored dry ice into the green-dyed Chicago River! Orange cross in a green river on St. Patrick’s Day…makes sense. Unfortunately, the ice hadn’t held together perfectly in the molding, so it was broken into a few pieces. Kevin looked really depressed, but all of a sudden grabbed a large piece, ran across the street, and threw it into the river anyway. We all followed with the other pieces then, not caring that it was broken or if other people were paying attention.

Afterwards, he gave the two of us forty dollars each for helping him, which we tried to refuse since it was unsuccessful, but he still handed it over. He explained that he had already done this twice before, once with steel molding and once with wood molding—the wood being the only successful one. What was even more interesting was that all three times he had been making the molding in the basement of college dorms I lived in! Unfortunately I have never been involved in this again, even though I have run into Kevin around the downtown area a few times.