Baby Food

Around the house* Dust crevices and hard-to-reach places with a clean, soft paintbrush that is damp.* Use a Lazy Susan to store smaller items such as jelly jars and baby food jars in refrigerator.This will avoid searching for items that often wind up toward the back of the shelf.* Remove burned coffee from bottom of glass pot.Fill with a handful of ice cubes; add about 1 teaspoon of salt; move pot around to agitate cubes until stain is removed.* Place steel wool over the drain when washing the family pet.This will prevent clogging pipes with fur.* When a plastic bag and a heated toaster meet, you end up with melted plastic on the appliance.

Ah, sensible January. New year's resolutions in place, sweet temptations are out with the old year.But if you've resolved to shed pounds, beware the occasional office birthday party complete with butter cream frosted sheet cake. Forget about that extra cupcake from the batch you've baked for your preschooler's winter carnival. And ignore that craving for devil's food, even after a Spartan weeknight dinner.Too much to bear? Manufacturers have an alternative -- reducing the fat when preparing the cake mixes that have become staples in American pantries.

Chapelgate Presbyterian Church, 2600 Marriottsville Road, Marriottsville, is serving as a drop-off location for Hurricane Sandy relief for supplies that are currently of greatest need in New York and New Jersey. The first pick-up was on Wednesday, Nov. 7, and weekly pickups will be made, according to the church website, www.chapelgate.org/sandy. The site notes that donated items can be dropped off at the church, in its Nursery Atrium, anytime the building is open, Monday through Friday and Sunday mornings.

A May 2, 2011 letter to the editor mischaracterizes a bill awaiting Gov. Martin O'Malley's signature on the chemical Bisphenol-A (BPA). The bill does not, as stated, ban infant formula infant formula and baby food packaging that contains more than 0.5 parts per billion (ppb) of BPA. Instead, the bill calls for the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene to deliver a report to the General Assembly next year on federal research and regulatory activities related to BPA, specifically addressing the availability and safety of substitutes for BPA used in containers for infant formula.

Q. I have Canada thistle growing in two of my flower beds, and I'm concerned about it spreading throughout my garden. I think I brought the seeds in on some manure I had delivered last spring. What's the best way to get rid of it without resorting to pesticides? A. Canada thistle is a tough perennial weed. It can spread vegetatively from underground stems called rhizomes or from the huge number of seeds that blow from the attractive purple flowers. Gently hand-pull young plants whenever they emerge.

WASHINGTON -- General Mills Inc.'s purchase of Chex cereal brands from Ralcorp Holdings Inc. got clearance yesterday from U.S. antitrust authorities, who moved to promote price competition for Chex, the key ingredient in a popular snack.General Mills, America's second-largest cereal maker, agreed to drop noncompete restrictions on the sale of private-label versions of Chex as a condition of Federal Trade Commission antitrust approval for its $570 million purchase of Chex and other products from Ralcorp.

Nutrition news '95 brought solid, usable information. The good news gleaned from this year's research sets the stage for some doable resolutions for next year. Here's what we learned.* Pregnancy and childbirth: Vitamin news for pregnant women tied good nutrition to birth-defects prevention. A March of Dimes study showed only 15 percent of childbearing-age women realize their need for folic acid, a B-vitamin shown to reduce neural-tube birth defects. Spina bifida and anencephaly occur within the first 28 days, before a woman knows she's pregnant, so good nutrition is essential before pregnancy begins.

Joan Meyers has a simple explanation why she learned to cook. "I think I got hungry," she said. She had done minimal cooking in her 20s -- spaghetti, black beans and rice. "Basic single people's food. But I grew up eating really well" -- her mother is a registered dietitian -- "and I finally decided if I wanted to eat that way, I would have to do it by myself."Meyers, 37, has been a vegetarian since she was 17. When she became interested in cooking a few years ago she began gathering ethnic cookbooks, and now has a significant collection.

Helen Hewitt of Sunbury, Pa., requested a recipe for peach marmalade and from the many responses, Chef Syglowski chose two. Both, he says, are delicious and very different. Also, one is for freezing, the other puts new meaning and flavor into glass baby food jars.Chrysanthy P. Stevens from Forest Hill says her recipe, "is a blend of sweet and bitter and is an excellent holiday gift when sealed in glass baby food jars."The recipe was published in "A Taste of Georgia," by the Newnan Service League in Newnan, Ga., says Mrs. Stevens who has enjoyed many recipes from the book.