Pancake

About 10 years ago, West Virginia native Catherine Pancake came to Baltimore for an outdoor street festival, and from the moment she arrived, the artist felt at home. When the trip was over, Pancake knew that Charm City was where she wanted to live. "[It's] a really nonpretentious creative atmosphere," said Pancake. "The people were very collaborative and very open." After moving to town, she immediately got involved in projects with other local artists, she said. And a decade later, Pancake, who is known for her films and experimental music, is still working with other creative Baltimoreans.

The best thing about Good Housekeeping's newest cookbook is just about every cook already has the most important ingredient you need: a blender. Blend It! (Hearst Books, 2003, $14.95) is a collection of 150 recipes from the folks who do simple better than anyone else, Good Housekeeping magazine's triple-testing editorial kitchens, under the direction of author Susan Westmoreland. And the appeal of this cookbook is that the blender isn't the only ingredient that cooks often have on hand.

Side dishes wield much more weight than the name implies. I think of them as supporting actors who help the lead shine in a play. But most of the time when planning a dinner menu, I decide on the main course and then as an afterthought pick the accompaniments. Typically, for meat or poultry entrees, I choose a seasonal vegetable paired with a potato, pasta or rice accompaniment. However, there are far more creative side-dish possibilities, as I recently discovered. A few weeks ago, I was testing a recipe for parmesan tuiles (French for "tiles")

Mary E. Colombo of Springdale, Ark., requested a recipe for potato pancakes. She is 89 years old and has lost the recipe she liked to use. She cut up raw potatoes and added them to other ingredients in a blender. She hopes someone has a recipe. Belle Elkins of Salisbury, N.C., writes: "I really hope this is the recipe that Mary E. Colombo was requesting. It's excellent with baked stuffed pork chops. You can also try these with applesauce or sour cream. So glad if I could help." Potato Pancakes Makes about 8 pancakes 3 cups raw potatoes, cubed 2 eggs 1/4 cup flour 1 small onion, cut into quarters 1 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon baking powder Wash, peel and cut up potatoes.

Union Bridge Fire Company will hold a pancake breakfast from 7 a.m. to noon Sunday at the fire hall. The menu will include sausage and sausage gravy, hominy, home fries, scrambled eggs, baked apples, biscuits, muffins, juice and coffee. The cost is $5 for adults; $2 for children ages 6 to 12; and free for age 5 and younger. The fire hall is at 8 W. Locust St. Information: 410-775-7422. Valley Lions Club sets community blood drive Valley Lions Club of Pleasant Valley will hold its fall community blood drive from 3 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Oct. 17 at the Pleasant Valley fire hall.

ALTHOUGH I HAD been watching games for weeks, that Friday night was the first time I could hear one. Perched on the hilltop sidewalk behind Jacksonville Elementary School in Phoenix, Md., I had watched my son's lacrosse games with binoculars. To help me find him in the sea of Carroll Manor Recreational Council blue jerseys, he wore a yellow T-shirt and left the shirttail out. Once I located the yellow-trimmed jersey, I knew I had found my 8-year-old son, Peter. That Friday, my friend, Jarrod, helped me down that hill, across the baseball field and over to the lacrosse game sidelines.

If there's ever an excuse to get out of bed on a lazy summer morning, it's having a stack of blueberry pancakes for breakfast. Imagine fat blueberries ready to burst with sweet juices. All you need to do is gently coat the berries with pancake batter and cook in a skillet. You're in for an incomparable feast. Although you'll see a lot of commercially prepared pancakes in supermarkets, none will come close to what you can make. Now that blueberry season is here, pull yourself - or lure your other half - out of bed with this luscious pancake recipe.

Early-morning entertaining is something I think about when we have overnight guests, so this past weekend when good friends came for a visit, I took time to plan a spring breakfast. I wanted the meal to be worthy of company but not so complicated that I would miss out on the conversation at the table. After going through my files, I found a simple recipe for blueberry sauce that I had not looked at for more than 20 years. The sauce could be assembled a day ahead and would be delicious, I thought, ladled over stacks of golden pancakes.

South Carroll High School Stagelighters will present the musical Sweet Charity at 7:30 p.m. today and tomorrow in the school auditorium. Sweet Charity is an offbeat musical of the 1960s about Charity Hope Valentine, an eternal optimist looking for love despite repeated disappointment. The Neil Simon script features tunes by Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields. Tickets are $5, and proceeds will benefit the drama club. The school is at 1300 W. Old Liberty Road in Winfield. Information: 410-751-3575.

There are some foods you crave on Sunday mornings: the uncomplicated and satisfying texture of pancakes or French toast, the sweetness of maple syrup and the fresh taste of fruit. But you can enjoy the familiar flavors in an appealing new package. As a change from the usual menu, serve cheese quesadillas. The dish is as easy to make as grilled cheese sandwiches. Arrange cheese on half a flour tortilla, fold over and fry in butter in a skillet. As soon as the tortilla is golden-brown and the cheese starts to ooze out, the quesadilla is ready, and you're in for a treat.