Food

Before sunrise Monday, Kevin and Shelley Taylor set out from their Millersville home to a new employment center for the Maryland Live! Casino, a slots parlor next to the Arundel Mills mall seeking workers for 1,500 jobs. Having tracked the progress of what will be the state's largest casino, the Taylors believe the facility could provide opportunity for their five-member family. Though Kevin Taylor has a job, he wants a better-paying one. And Shelley Taylor has been out of work for several months.

Maryland public schools will all soon be keeping emergency supplies of epinephrine on hand for students who may have an allergic reaction, and patient advocates are applauding the new law . “Receiving a dose of epinephrine in the critical minutes following exposure to a food allergen can mean the difference between life and death,” said Susan Sweitzer, executive director of the Maryland-DC Chapter of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of...

The story of a 24-year-old Georgia graduate student fighting a flesh-eating disease has prompted a microbiologist with the Veterans Affairs Maryland Health Care System to speak out about the infection. Aimee Copeland lost most of her left leg after the flesh-eating bacteria necrotizing faciitis is believed to have entered a cut on her leg, according to the Associated Press, which reports she may also have to have her fingers amputated. The waterborne bacteria Aeromonas hydrophila is believed to have caused the infection.

The owners of Kooper's Tavern, Katie and Patrick Russell, will open a Baltimore County location in Lutherville's Round Wood Shopping Center. The new location will be called Kooper's North. A new food truck, Woody's Taco Island, is also on its way. The Lutherville location was formerly the home of Roddy Domacasse's Restaurant Sabor, which closed suddenly last summer. The Russells will operate Kooper's North in a partnership with Miles Perman, according to Patrick Russell, who said that he hopes to have the new location open by Aug. 21. In addition to Kooper's Tavern, the Russells own the Thames Street properties Slainte Irish Pub and Woody's Rum Bar and Celie's Waterfront Inn . They also own Kooper's Chowhound Burger Wagon, the first truck in Baltimore's food-truck fleet.

If all goes as planned, sometime this morning a spacecraft will blast off from its launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and ride a fiery plume of contrails upward through the pre-dawn darkness to begin a two-week journey to the International Space Station and back. But the flight won't be just another NASA resupply mission. Instead, the Falcon 9 rocket and its unmanned Dragon cargo capsule built by Space Exploration Technologies Corporation - SpaceX for short - will be the first commercially owned and operated vehicle ever to rendezvous with the station's orbiting astronauts.

Hundreds of people lined up on sun-drenched asphalt Saturday to see if they could get regular payouts, in the form of paychecks, from the new Maryland Live! Casino, a slots casino scheduled to open at Arundel Mills mall in about three months. "I hope I get lucky enough to get a position," said Mark Ellison, who's from West Baltimore. "They want people who are willing to go the extra mile so customers come in and enjoy spending their money. " The operators of what will be the state's largest casino hosted a job fair Saturday with the Anne Arundel Workforce Development Corp.

After a seven-year delay, Randallstown residents cheered Monday over an announcement that a Walmart will open on Liberty Road next year. Officials and residents have long hoped that the store — a planned $9 million, 160,000-square-foot supercenter with groceries and a pharmacy — would revitalize the aging commercial corridor, encouraging other national retailers and restaurants to set up shop in the affluent, largely black community....

MY SON'S buddy, Paul, walked in the front door sucking on a bottle of what looked like apple juice and, because I well know Paul's aversion to any fluids that aren't caramel-colored and carbonated, I asked what he was drinking."

Baltimore soon will be getting a taste of Bubba Gump Shrimp.It's easy to forget that, behind all the controversy surrounding Inner Harbor development issues, there is actually a restaurant. It is a unique restaurant at that: based on a popular movie and sporting some of the most strangely named food this side of the Atlantic.The Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. chain was born out of a joint venture between Paramount Pictures and the California-based Rusty Pelican Restaurants.The first of these theme restaurants, based on Paramount's 1994 Oscar-winning film, "Forrest Gump," opened two years ago on Cannery Row in Monterey, Calif.

The Daily Meal, a food-and-dining website, has published list of the 10 Best College Towns for Food. Baltimore didn't make the list, but Baltimore isn't a college town. So, no hard feelings. The top ten college towns for food were 1) Berkeley, Calif., Ann Arbor, Mich., Princeton, N.J., Oxford, Miss., Chapel Hill, N.C., Burlington, Vt., Eugene, Ore., Ithaca, N.Y., Boulder, Colo., and Madison, Wis. Here's that list on TheDailyMeal.com. Did your old college town show up?

The Maryland Live Casino is getting closer.The Cordish Cos.have announced June 6 as the opening date for its $500 million gaming and entertainment complex. The food and beverage team at Maryland Live has been in place for months, preparing for the casino's first guests. The casino's executive chef is Rudy Volpe, most recently of Carmine's in Washington, and the director of food and beverage for the casino is Greg Van Stone, most recently the director of restaurants for the Waldorf Astoria in Orlando, Fla. Volpe and Van Stone will be responsible for the casino's food operations, including the Live Market Buffet , an Asian noodle bar and a Phillips Seafood outlet.

It's farmers' market time, and all those fruits and vegetables seem so fresh. But they aren't necessarily clean. Like supermarket produce, these local and even organic items need a wash before eating, according to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics , a professional education and advocacy group. The group and the food giant ConAgra are reminding everyone that one in six Americans get sick annually from food-borne pathogens. About 3,000 people die every year from food poisoning.

Your recent editorial expressed the view that "the ban on grocery store sales of alcohol has one purpose - preventing competition, to the benefit of existing retailers and to the detriment of consumers" ("Liquor and capitalism," May 14). Yet it also has the effect of de-emphasizing liquor to families shopping for food with hard-earned dollars. All the dollars, time and effort devoted to learning about, tasting, shipping, buying and imbibing alcohol may someday be directed toward more important things, such as wholesome food, good conversation, outdoor activities and the arts - and even reading newspapers.

Maryland-based Giant Food says it will be moving into a Perry Hall shopping center at Belair Road and Hannon Court. Construction workers are now turning a 57,000-square-foot retail site, formerly occupied by Super Fresh, into a Giant Food store. The new store will open later this year. Earlier this year, Giant acquired and converted two stores in Baltimore in Parkville.

Letter writer Gilbert Ross implies that there is no comparison between eating pizza and smoking ("Eating a slice a pizza is not the same as smoking a cigarette," May 10). As a physician, I disagree. Both tobacco and processed meats increase risk for cancer, heart disease and premature death. In fact, processed meat and other unhealthful foods kill more Americans annually than does tobacco. But this isn't just my opinion. A large body of research supports the link between processed meat and poor health.

Keith Losoya thinks a terrible thing to waste is waste itself. Losoya is the founder and principal partner of Waste Neutral, a small Baltimore firm that helps businesses and institutions compost leftover food that would otherwise go in the trash. The company started consulting in 2008 and began hauling the next year. Another business does the actual composting, but Waste Neutral gives its clients credits so they can get some of the compost back for use wherever they like — in gardens, at urban farms or on other property.

This weekend's Polish Festival will include food stands, a staple in ethnic showcases. The treats served are easy to carry around so you don't miss out on any of the festivities, but don't think their portability takes away from their authenticity. Coordinator Maryann Fredrick says that these foods are true to tradition and will entice people to come to the inner harbor. The menu she organized includes such favorites as: • Kielbasa (Polish Sausage): This recipe calls for pork, more pork, and a fair amount of garlic.

The Scientific American blog network has a juicy looking collection of posts up on the subject of food and eating. The round-up is called Passions of Food . I have to admit, I love this stuff, especially the articles by anthropologists. Some of the posts were produced freshly for this round-up; others, like Bora Zivkovic's Do you love or Hate or Cilantro? , are from the archives, I've barely cracked the spine, but I'm looking forward to Krytal D'Costa on the culture of  coffee drinkers and Christie Wilcox on the myths of organic farming . Bt right now, though, I'm going to read D'Costa's Are We Ashamed of Lunch?

Plug Ugly's Publick House is a strange name for a tavern. But Baltimore history buffs know the Plug Uglies were a thuggish street gang/political club that ran riot on Baltimore's streets in the 1850s. Don't worry. The newest resident of O'Donnell Square isn't a gangland. Bartenders with untucked shirts are about as rough as it gets, and the staff here, you may be sorry to know, seems to have been chosen for their gentle dispositions. At first glance, Plug Ugly's could pass for any number of its neighbors, but look closer: The wood-filled bar area and dining rooms have been generously furnished with salvaged material like church pews and antique lighting fixtures.

Four young men broke into the Stadium Place YMCA in Waverly early Tuesday and stole a 60-inch television, a portable oxygen tank and food, and also damaged a vending and bank machine, Baltimore police said Wednesday. A spokeswoman for the YMCA of Central Maryland had said on Tuesday that the break-in was confined to the lobby of the building on East 33rd Street, the site of the old Memorial Stadium. She had declined to say if anything was taken, but said damage was quickly cleaned up. The police report details far more extensive damage.