Beans

These learning games use everyday household items and can be fun for you and your child to do together during the summer months.Vocabulary: Using dry lima beans, write a word to be reviewed on each with a fine-tipped marker. Place five to 10 beans into a small can. Let your child shake out the beans and read each word, then use it in a sentence.Comprehension: Write a sentence on a strip of paper. Then cut the sentence apart into individual words and place them in a lunch bag. Have your child empty the bag and put the sentence together.

Chili is evocative food. The scent of a simmering batch transports me back to my youth in southern Ontario, when thermoses of my mother's steaming-hot stew came along on family ski trips to protect us against the Canadian cold.It wasn't until much later that I realized chili could be as flexible as it is fortifying. While the dish is always anchored by red chili, beyond that almost anything goes.Mom's chili, for example, was delicious but limited: ground beef, kidney beans, tomatoes and chili powder.

Severna Park is still the king in Anne Arundel County volleyball and not about to give up the throne if yesterday's sweep of Broadneck in a matchup of unbeatens is any indication.Strong and timely serving enabled the No. 4 Falcons to roll, 15-3, 15-12, 15-11, over the No. 7 Bruins in Cape St. Claire yesterday.With the win, Severna Park took over sole possession of first place in the county league.Despite his Bruins (7-1 league, 7-1 overall) owning only two wins over the Falcons (8-0, 8-3)

With visions of tender-crisp snap beans drizzled with thyme butter dancing in my head, I ache to get everything in the ground now, but resist the temptation.April is an unsettled time in the garden, when warm days can be followed by chilly rains and cool nights, which makes it a transitional planting time. Cool weather vegetables like lettuces, beets and carrots can continue to go in. It's last call for peas and spinach, except for the New Zealand type. You can also begin planting warmer-weather vegetables -- corn, Florence fennel, chard and beans, most of which, like earlier vegetables, benefit your table by succession planting -- sowing new seed every 10 days to two weeks -- for a continuous supply of superbly fresh produce.

Annapolis Housing Authority employees will spend two hours immersed in the drug culture this morning, learning how a crack cocaine pipe can be crafted from a soda can and what a "Loveboat" is (marijuana sprinkled with PCP).Far from being illegal, the drug and paraphernalia class has been ordered by their boss, Patricia Croslan. And their instructor -- Annapolis City Police Lt. Robert E. Beans -- is on the right side of the law."It's of great importance for people to be able to identify drug paraphernalia, particularly when they work in an environment where they might come across it," said Croslan, the Housing Authority director.

Q. I have some small forest trees that I'd like to move to a different part of my property. Isn't fall a good time to do this?A. Yes, it's fine to transplant trees in the fall, but your chances for a successful move will improve if you wait until March, just before your trees break dormancy.This is especially true this year, because trees are severely stressed by the drought and may not have enough foods built up to help them withstand a fall transplanting.If you decide to wait, you could get a jump on things by preparing the planting area now. That would save you from having to dig in wet soil in the spring.

ANNAPOLIS CITY leaders, who whined about footing the bill for a New Year's Eve celebration expenses, apparently aren't so tight with a buck when it comes to a potentially costly day in court.The city was ready to let Annapolis First Night proceed without its participation and on city-owned properties because it didn't want to absorb the cost of police overtime and cleanup. Fortunately, Annapolis-based USinternetworking Inc. bailed out the city by agreeing to kick in $18,000 for the annual celebration.

Annapolis Housing Authority employees will spend two hours immersed in the drug culture this morning, learning how a crack cocaine pipe can be crafted from a soda can and what a "Loveboat" is (marijuana sprinkled with PCP).Far from being illegal, the drug and paraphernalia class has been ordered by their boss, Patricia Croslan. And their instructor -- Annapolis City Police Lt. Robert E. Beans -- is on the right side of the law."It's of great importance for people to be able to identify drug paraphernalia, particularly when they work in an environment where they might come across it," said Croslan, the Housing Authority director.

There's nothing quite as much fun as heading to the farmers' market on a weekend morning, roaming the stalls, sparking a few ideas for dinner and then heading home to cook.But most of the time, we're cooking dinner between doing a half dozen other things. The mark of a real cook is being able to fix a good meal in the midst of real life.Let's face it: Given perfect ingredients, any fool can turn out a decent dish. It's when there's no time to find the perfect ripe tomatoes or the piece of fish that smells just like the sea that good cooking becomes a challenge.

Baked beans like those made by the old Horn & Hardart restaurant was the request of Marci K. Weiner of Baltimore.Frank C. Alfonso of Baltimore responded with a recipe he said Weiner is sure to like. He added: "I like using an old earthenware crock and I sometimes place strips of bacon on the top of the beans towards the end of the baking period. What a hearty and tasty dish!"Cynthia Sparks of Baltimore wants to make spareribs like those she had on vacation this past summer at J. K.'s Ribs in Kill Devil Hills, N.C. She wrote, "My family cannot wait to go there again just for the rib's sake.

Two men were killed and two were seriously injured in a quadruple shooting in a parking lot behind a bar and strip mall in Odenton shortly after last call early yesterday, according to Anne Arundel County police. Most customers were still in the Traffic Bar & Lounge, a neighborhood tavern and dance club across from Fort Meade, manager Bill Major said, when a security guard heard gunshots outside while trying to clear loiterers. Major said he and other workers shut the bar doors, which open to the parking lot and to Annapolis Road, and wouldn't let anyone leave until police arrived.

I was surprised by the number of people, a little more than 100, who had gathered to eat cassoulet. Cassoulet, a slow-cooked French stew, is not trendy or light. It is ancient fare and full of beans. Legend says it was created by starving peasants in southwestern France as a way to overcome the siege of the English during the Hundred Years' War. Yet on a recent Saturday night, nine cooks had gone to the considerable trouble of making cassoulets, and a crowd of eaters was milling about the backyard of the Guilford home of Dick and Leslie Leitch, sampling the goods, then voting for favorites.

PLAYER OF THE YEAR Brittany Lilley Severna Park An accomplished basketball player who has accepted a scholarship to play that sport at St. Francis (Pa.), Lilley led a talented group at Severna Park that handed state champion Broadneck its only loss of the year in the Anne Arundel County championship game. In that match, she recorded 24 digs, a career-high, and added eight kills. "She knew we needed those digs to win that match," Falcons coach Jamie Leventry said of his three-year starter.

Well-cooked beans are delicious, and they can't be beat as a thrifty source of rich nutrients. Packed with protein, vitamins, minerals and fiber, they play a starring role in cuisines from around the world. Canned beans are convenient, but they're often mushy and loaded with salt. Properly cooked from-scratch beans, on the other hand, are creamy and just tender enough. Tuscan Shrimp with White Beans Makes 4 servings 2 cups cooked white beans (navy, cannellini or lima) 6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil plus more for serving (divided use)

I AM NOT SURE WHEN IT HAPpened, but at some point Easter stopped being about new clothes and started being about food. I grew up in a time when Easter Sunday required a whole new outfit, from hat to shoes. As a little girl, Easter meant new patent leather Mary Janes and a bonnet with an annoying elastic string under the chin. If the holiday came late enough in the season, it might be good for a new pair of white summer sandals. When I was older, Easter meant something in navy blue and white.

A returning All-County hitter and three-year starter for the defending county champion Bruins, Malesick had 190 kills and 120 blocks last year as a sophomore. The 6-foot junior, who has a 3.5 grade point average and scored 1,700 on her SAT, has decided to graduate early in 2007. It's a big loss for coach Romonzo Beans and his No. 6 Bruins, who last won a state title in Malesick's freshman year. Why are you graduating early? Well, I want to play volleyball in college and I know what I want to do. So I figured I should get out early and get to college early.

At the lush community garden tucked behind Temple Oheb Shalom in Upper Park Heights, Larry Kloze gently checks rows of vegetables for signs of their health and progress and for the idiosyncrasies of his fellow gardeners. "You can tell a lot about a person after they pick a row of beans," he says. "Picking beans is a measure of someone's inner strength. It takes restraint and concentration and patience and understanding. The bean plant's fragile: If you just bend it a little, you can break the stem and the whole leaf structure dies.

You know your wine comes from Bordeaux, your goat cheese from a farm in California and your coffee from a free-trade plantation in Costa Rica. Now you can trace the origin of your chocolate beans. The trend in chocolate is toward higher cocoa percentages in single-origin varieties that feature the unique taste, smell and texture of an area, be it Java, Tanzania or Santo Domingo. So for your sophisticated sweetheart this Valentine's Day, you might want to dust off your atlas. "There's something ultra-luxurious about a straightforward, delicious chocolate that is created in a small production, hands-on environment," says Edye Sanford, 40, a Baltimore clothing designer and seamstress who enjoys single-origin chocolates at her monthly mothers' group meeting.

Collecting taxes and counting beans. Those are the chief duties of the state comptroller. Sure, he also gets to monitor the quality of motor fuels and make sure that shot of Smirnoff you order at the corner bar really is 80 proof. But the latter task sounds like more fun than it really is, since it's a bunch of inspectors who go out to Maryland watering holes, not the comptroller himself. So who can blame Peter Franchot for trying to make more of the job that he's trying to wrest away from William Donald Schaefer?

First, the good news: Most people don't really gain five or 10 pounds during the holiday-feasting season that begins today. Now the bad: The little bit they do gain remains with them, on average, forever. The average U.S. adult gains 1.06 pounds between the fall and spring seasons, according to the National Institutes of Health. Measured the next fall, they are on average four-tenths of a pound to 1.8 pounds heavier than they were the previous year. Year over year, holiday after holiday, the pounds add up, incrementally ballooning the figure and increasing the risks to the body and the nation's health-insurance and work-productivity rates.