Cold Water

One of my challenges as a new bride in 1957 was learning how to cook fresh vegetables. Some recipes said to cover with cold water and some mentioned hot water. My mother told me that vegetables grown underground (now called root vegetables) get covered with cold water and vegetables that are grown above the ground get started in hot water. According to Harold McGee, dean of American food-scientists, your mother was absolutely correct. McGee, author of On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen (Scribner, 2004, $40)

Every offseason this happens. Sometimes it happens three, four, five times in the winter. A reporter attaches the Orioles to a star free agent's name. And then those of us who cover the team locally will get inundated with questions about whether the Orioles will land that player. Right now, it is Texas outfielder Josh Hamilton. After Fox Sports wrote Wednesday that the Orioles plan to pursue Hamilton, MLB Network did several minutes on whether Hamilton would be a fit in Baltimore.

Every offseason this happens. Sometimes it happens three, four, five times in the winter. A reporter attaches the Orioles to a star free agent's name. And then those of us who cover the team locally will get inundated with questions about whether the Orioles will land that player. Right now, it is Texas outfielder Josh Hamilton. After Fox Sports wrote Wednesday that the Orioles plan to pursue Hamilton, MLB Network did several minutes on whether Hamilton would be a fit in Baltimore.

I gather that there is some brouhaha today about a fast-food chain that serves mediocre fried chicken. (The One True Fried Chicken was made in an iron skillet by my mother and grandmother, and anything else is a pale and shoddy imitation.) Really, if you are going to eat fast food, Cincinnati chili is a far more satisfactory dish. Unfortunately, Skyline has no outlets in Baltimore, but I have a recipe for one variant of Cincinnati chili from the late Bob Johnson, my first news editor at The Cincinnati Enquirer , and I am willing to impart the secret to you. But first, a caution.

MARCH 12 WAS the kind of day you can get on the bay from late winter, nearly until summer -- pleasant and deadly.With air temperatures pushing the high 50s and no wind, Charles Lee Cecil may have felt he could easily swim to the nearby Choptank shore from his disabled boat that afternoon.But water temperatures were another story entirely, say Maryland Natural Resources Police, who found the Easton-area man's shoeless, shirtless corpse a few days later.The temperature of the Choptank was still less than 50, below which water is defined as "very cold," says the University of Manitoba's Gordon Giesbrecht, an expert on how cold affects human physiology.

Around the house* Clean oven racks easily. Place racks on a towel in bathtub. BTC Cover with hot water; sprinkle 1 cup of automatic dishwashing detergent into the water and let sit. Stains will soak off.* Remove stains from cork coasters. Dip into cold water and rub spots off with a pumice stone. Rinse with cold water.* Try storing silver with a piece of aluminum foil to keep it tarnish free.* Marinate meat in a plastic grocery bag that has been twisted tightly shut and placed in a bowl. You can turn meat easily without spattering and bowl will remain clean.

Don't thaw frozen cranberries before using. Simply rinse in cold water and use as directed for fresh cranberries.-- Cole's Cooking A to Z

KITCHEN TIP To wash greens, fill a sink with cold water and soak them for several minutes to remove sand and grit. Rinse in a colander under cold water. "Welcome to the Table," by House Beautiful recipe4living.com This Web site offers user-rated recipes, coupons, daily recipe e-mails and chat features for dedicated home cooks. Star chef Wolfgang Puck contributed commentary to the site. Chicago Tribune

Iwas out shopping, but I couldn't take it any more. Better cold water than sweat. I'm sick of sweating."- JESSICA BLUE, 54, of New York, on why she climbed into the fountain at Manhattan's Washington Square Park, drenching her clothes and hat, on Tuesday, when temperatures in the city neared 100 degrees [THE ASSOCIATED PRESS]

Officer Americus J. Rambeau wasn't diving for a penny in the Inner Harbor on Wednesday night, but he did swim to save one. Rambeau and other officers from the city police's marine unit rescued a black Labrador mix named Penny from a pier at Harborview Marina after she left her Federal Hill home, crossed Key Highway and leaped into the cold water. "It was the right thing to do. [Penny] was struggling. Exhausted," said Rambeau, who donned a cold-water rescue suit and had to swim under two piers to capture the dog. Penny's owner, Rachel Naumann, who asked to meet the officers from the unit Thursday and hugged them, said she was at work when her roommate opened the front door to sign for a package and Penny got out. She said she spent hours searching the streets.

Shawn Kimbro will speak to the Coastal Conservation Association Maryland's newly revived Annapolis chapter Tuesday at the Boatyard Bar & Grill. He'll be discussing cold-water jigging as well as Careful Catch Maryland, a program started collectively by the CCA and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation on the best way to release fish after catching them. Kimbro will also talk about his self-published book, "Chesapeake Light Tackle – an introduction to light tackle fishing on the Chesapeake Bay. " The Baltimore Sun spoke to Kimbro last week about light-tackle fishing, the Careful Catch Maryland program and his book.

100 Years Ago H2 Ohhhh! In the classifieds: "For Rent: Blacksmith and Wheelwright Shop and Dwelling House at Cooksville. Best stand in the county. R.H. MERCER. Cooksville, Rd. For Sale: 130 Acre Farm, situated on the Triadelphia Pike, one mile form Frederick Pike. Good Spring close to house, running water in barn. J.S. BROWN, Ellicott City, Md. Route 3. " In the latter ad, it makes sense to have the more efficient watering system for the animal occupants of the barn, who lap it up by the gallons, than for the humans in the home.

Officer Americus J. Rambeau wasn't diving for a penny in the Inner Harbor on Wednesday night, but he did swim to save one. Rambeau and other officers from the city police's marine unit rescued a black Labrador mix named Penny from a pier at Harborview Marina after she left her Federal Hill home, crossed Key Highway and leaped into the cold water. "It was the right thing to do. [Penny] was struggling. Exhausted," said Rambeau, who donned a cold-water rescue suit and had to swim under two piers to capture the dog. Penny's owner, Rachel Naumann, who asked to meet the officers from the unit Thursday and hugged them, said she was at work when her roommate opened the front door to sign for a package and Penny got out. She said she spent hours searching the streets.

With flu season and the MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) staph infection upon us, we are urged to wash our hands frequently, usually "with warm, soapy water." My memories of Bacteriology 101 aren't clear, but I can't recall that warm water kills anything. Soapsuds, on the other hand, do carry nasty things away. Is there any science behind the "warm water" suggestion? You are absolutely right that warm water is no more effective than cold for removing germs. Soap and water don't kill germs, but only wash them off the surface of the skin.

NEW YORK -- Like airplanes backed up on a runway, dozens of pending multibillion-dollar corporate buyout deals involving such familiar names as Hilton Hotels and Clear Channel Communications are waiting to take off. But if Wall Street's instincts are correct, the global credit crunch might ground some of them. Plunging stock prices of companies that already have agreed to be bought at higher values suggest that investors believe some deals could be shaky. There's more at stake than big year-end bonuses on Wall Street.

As summer wanes and fall is still a promise, we make our annual exploratory trip to check on what we like to think of as our secret blackberry patch. (Actually it's not that secret, since we have permission from the landowner to pick.) We inspect every outcropping of canes, pinching the knobby fruit and nibbling an occasional berry to gauge ripeness. Lucky for blackberry lovers, this succulent and prolific fruit can be found throughout North America. Blackberries aren't ready for picking until late summer or autumn, depending to a great degree on region.

As summer wanes and fall is still a promise, we make our annual exploratory trip to check on what we like to think of as our secret blackberry patch. (Actually it's not that secret, since we have permission from the landowner to pick.) We inspect every outcropping of canes, pinching the knobby fruit and nibbling an occasional berry to gauge ripeness. Lucky for blackberry lovers, this succulent and prolific fruit can be found throughout North America. Blackberries aren't ready for picking until late summer or autumn, depending to a great degree on region.

COLD-WEATHER BOATINGLast fall, one person among a group of sea duck hunters drowned after the anchor line fouled and the boat they were aboard in Eastern Bay capsized. This week, a kayaker who set out from Annapolis for St. Michaels in high winds last weekend was presumed to have drowned after his empty boat was found with his life jacket still aboard.Each year such cold-weather boating accidents kill more than 200 persons, according to statistics supplied by the Boat Owners Association of the United States.

SOLOMONS -- A sudden burst of wind overturned several sailboats yesterday afternoon in the harbor of Solomons in Calvert County, plunging students from a local sailing school into frigid waters. It proved a good lesson in the vagaries of weather - and one that left no one injured. Close to a dozen of the young boaters - all wearing wet suits and life jackets - found themselves dumped into the still-frigid water off the Solomons harbor, but quickly were rescued after the vessels capsized about 4:30 p.m. Weather across the region had changed abruptly as a cold front swept through - as evident from the winds at Baltimore-Washington Thurgood Marshall Airport increasing from 5 mph at BWI around 2 p.m. to gusts as strong as 28 mph later in the afternoon.

KITCHEN TIP To wash greens, fill a sink with cold water and soak them for several minutes to remove sand and grit. Rinse in a colander under cold water. "Welcome to the Table," by House Beautiful recipe4living.com This Web site offers user-rated recipes, coupons, daily recipe e-mails and chat features for dedicated home cooks. Star chef Wolfgang Puck contributed commentary to the site. Chicago Tribune