Russ, actually I know of several people who had problems with the earlier casting Edelbrocks leaking coolant from that area after they had been in service a while. After it was discovered Edelbrock filled in most of that recess to eliminate that issue.

I'm happy to hear TF is listening and is planning on filling in the squares.
On the heads I had here, if you wanted to use a Cometic gasket you absolutely would have had to fill in the squares since those gaskets didn't seal off either side of the square. It just created an open path from the valley to the outside of the engine.