So, what do you think about that Chinese idea you should pay your doctor when you stay healthy?

I’ve shamelessly cherry-picked the presentation tips from Scott’s book that I most agree with.

1. Let go of perfection

If you’d like to be good at something, the first thing to go out the window is the notion of perfection. Every time is I get up to the front of the room, I know I will make mistakes.

I so agree. I get so annoyed by courses, books and  articles that claim to help you deliver the perfect presentation. Not only is there no such thing, that type of thinking will sabotage your efforts to deliver a competent, effective and engaging presentation.

Olivia Mitchell picks the top six tips from Scott Berkun's Confessions of a Public Speaker. Click through for five more.

Cast-Iron Skillet the Key to "Serious" Homemade Pizza

Earlier this month we pointed out a clever idea for using your cast-iron skillet to cook pizza. Today, The Atlantic goes in-depth on cast-iron pizza cooking, crowning it the "secret to serious pizza."

Writer and foodie Vaughn Tan tested various pizza-cooking methods to get the closest-to-restaurant-quality results possible. Here's what he found:

A cast-iron skillet and a broiler in combination are the easy secret to a light, airy, moist, chewy, crisp, lightly-charred pizza without an expensive wood-fired oven or a potentially-expensive experiment with your home oven's safety lock. This pizza will not be quite as good as something baked in under a minute in a roaring-hot pizza oven, but it comes awfully close, all things considered.

The full recipe Tan followed is available here, but the majority of his recipe details the finer points of the cooking process. For example, to prepare the skillet and the oven:

Turn on the broiler and preheat the dry, ungreased skillet on the stovetop on the highest setting for eight to 10 minutes. As soon as you begin heating the skillet, lightly flour a wood cutting board, or better yet a pizza peel.

It's an intense process, and not exactly something you can throw together in a few minutes (his suggested dough needs four to six days to mature), but if you're looking to make a great homemade pizza, it's worth a try.

The Cast-Iron Secret to Serious Pizza [The Atlantic]

Strange to see this posted at Lifehacker just after I used the technique to make Pebble Bread. I'm a believer.