Ahh, September

August 27, 2008

What is the best month to chow down in Maryland?

Recent columns

• Coming Clean

  August 23, 2008

  There are, I discovered, two ways to clean and seal a wood deck. There is the approach I have taken when tackling the task. That would be cleaning the deck with a garden hose and sealing it with a paint roller. Then there is the mode professionals such as Jim Yeiser and Phil Muth employ. They clean the wood with a power washer, then apply the sealant with a mist emitted by a power spray.

• Sailors tackle crabs in feast

  August 20, 2008

  You join the Navy to see the world and then one night you end up in Baltimore, wrestling with this strange supper called Maryland crabs.

• Tomato time

  August 13, 2008

  Sitting in her Sparks kitchen on a broiling Maryland morning, Claire Jones was encircled by tomatoes. In front of her was a dish of scalloped tomatoes, a fragrant golden gratin, a mixture of sliced potatoes, herbs, cheese and sliced tomatoes. Behind her, in a basket on a kitchen counter, rested a few Big Boys and Snow Whites, some of the first homegrown tomatoes of the season. Outside her kitchen window, visible from the kitchen table, were rows of tomato plants, heavy with fruit and bearing colorful names like Black Brandywine, Howard German, Speckled Roman, Green Sausage, Box Car Willie and Federle.

• Beer bubbles to top of the poll

  August 6, 2008

  Beer rules. It is the alcoholic beverage we Americans say we drink most often, besting wine, its closest competitor, by double digits.

• Eating Maryland food for a week

  July 30, 2008

  I am game for almost any eating challenge, as long as it does not involve swallowing that hated slimy, stewed okra.

• Fan fare

  July 26, 2008

  Ceiling fans don't lower the temperature of a room, but they do make us feel cooler. That is what the ventilation experts say. A U.S. Department of Energy publication points out that a ceiling fan moves the air in a room, and that when air moves over our skin, we feel comfortable. This government research, in other words, confirms common sense.

• Melons make things better

  July 23, 2008

  My solution to the trials of life is eating watermelon. This is not a year-round cure-all. It only works now, in hot weather.

• Ore. trip broadens culinary horizons

  July 16, 2008

  I am going to eat more animal parts, add some excitement to my coffee-drinking routine and memorize the five different species of wild Pacific salmon. That is what I resolved recently after returning from a week of vacation eating and drinking in Oregon.

• Let's give a cheer for our state's flavorful tomatoes

  July 9, 2008

  For tomato lovers, this month could not get here fast enough. July is the time that the good stuff, tomatoes grown in Maryland fields, starts to ripen.

• Drops in a bucket

  June 28, 2008

  If you're looking to be more green this summer, or if at least you'd like your garden to be, a rain barrel could be the solution.

• Berries work their magic

  June 25, 2008

  The raw lime tasted like candied fruit. The slice of naked grapefruit was, I would have sworn, drenched in brown sugar. The dill pickle tasted sweet initially, but it packed a surprisingly hot finish. The Guinness tasted like chocolate malt.

• New way to enjoy young radishes

  June 18, 2008

  On a recent sweltering Sunday morning, I prowled the farmers' market in downtown Baltimore looking for something interesting to take home and fix for lunch. There were a lot of flowers and radishes for sale. While I know you can eat flowers - I once had a terrific salad flecked with nasturtiums at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Calif. - I leaned toward the radishes.

• Learning new tricks for old grills

  June 11, 2008

  As Father's Day approached, I looked for new grilling tricks that a smoky old dad, a fan of live fires, might employ. Leafing through a slew of new grilling books and testing recipes, I found several.

• Holiday sips: The joy flows

  December 5, 2007

  Giving the gift of alcohol can be tricky. You have to be reasonably certain that the recipients enjoy imbibing. You should have a rough idea of their tastes, and know that they are over 21 years old. Then there is the matter of money. How much do you want to spend on these people?

• Thankful for those leftovers

  November 21, 2007

  Tomorrow, as I dig into the roast turkey, the corn-bread stuffing, the hominy casserole, the mashed potatoes and gravy, I also will be thinking about how good these dishes will taste at the many eating opportunities stretched over the weekend.

• Beyond wine for holiday dinner

  November 14, 2007

  Once you have answered the sticky Thanksgiving questions - what type of turkey stuffing and what set of relatives you are going to spend the day with - the next issue to solve is, what are you going to be sipping?

• Crunch time: Crisp critters prove hard to swallow

  May 19, 2004

  THE KEY TO enjoying cooked cicadas -- if that is possible -- is to eat them with your eyes closed.

• These events leave a cloud over our city

  July 21, 2001

  IHAVE NOT had much luck thinking up a new slogan for Baltimore. But after the events of this week, I do have a new candidate for the city's mascot. That would be Joe Bfstplk the Li'l Abner comic strip character who walked around with a rain cloud over his head. Joe Bfstplk was a human jinx, wherever he went, calamity followed.

• Toning down thoughts on phone repair

  February 17, 2001

  TRYING TO FIX a telephone these days is frustrating.

• 'A piece of the action' makes things a bit nutty

  February 7, 2001

  THE SIEGE OF the pine nuts began a few weeks ago, shortly after we got a late-night phone call from James "Buzzy" Cusack, a friend and neighbor. Buzzy said something like " Psssst, wanna buy some pine nuts?"