How do I restrict posts from a specific category?

Here is the code that makes 5 posts from whatever category appear in a column on my home page. I want to exclude posts from category 363 from appearing in this column. How do I do it?

<div class="featured">
				<?php $recent = new WP_Query("showposts=5"); while($recent->have_posts()) : $recent->the_post();?>
				<h2><a href="<?php the_permalink() ?>" rel="bookmark"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2>
				<img src="<?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "feature", true); ?>" alt="<?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "Theme Name", true); ?> " />
				<?php the_content(__('Read the story &raquo;'));?><div style="clear:both;"></div>
				<?php endwhile; ?>