Salt

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.

I am not a cake person.  If you put a giant, lovely cake next to a bowl of crispy fries doused in malt vinegar, salt, and pepper, I would grab the fries and leave the cake feeling unwanted and alone while I devoured my hypothetical starches.   Not loving sweets is usually a great thing. I rarely order dessert (unless "salted" is in the description), and the candy aisle holds no power over me. Something like chocolate covered pretzels will occasionally pique my fancy, but then, there's salt involved there, too. The problem with cake is that it's all sweet.

I BELIEVE IN "sweating" eggplant. Usually I slice it, sprinkle salt on the slices and let them sit for half an hour or more. The salt draws moisture and bitterness out of the eggplant. At least that is what the pro-sweat contingent believes. This is not a universal view. There is also a "no sweat" camp. Its members contend that there is no need for such roughhouse tactics, especially when dealing with fresh eggplant. Patricia Wells, for instance, pleaded with readers of her 1993 cookbook, "Trattoria," to spare the salt and to treat eggplant gently.

Alireza Jafarzadeh's recent commentary ("Iran'snuclear genie is out of the bottle," April 16) is eerily reminiscent of the manipulations of Iraqi exile Ahmad Chalabi who shamelessly fed the US government false information with the express aim of advocating a military invasion of Iraq in 2003 in order to promote his own personal political and economic fortunes. Just as Mr. Jafarzadeh openly sides with the exiled Iranian terrorist group Mujahedin-e Khalq, Mr. Chalibi lived in London while leading an umbrella Iraqi opposition group (the Iraqi National Congress)

It's Wednesday night in Upper Fells Point and I'm sitting at the bar of the restaurant Salt. The restaurant has entered its chilled-out mode; dinner service ends in a half-hour at 10:30 p.m. A jazzy score - Charles Mingus and Roy Hargrove - murmurs in the background, and a mute TV is ignored in a far corner. A dozen or so green-colored lamps that look like a squadron of flying saucers give the bar a cool, moody glow. Though the atmosphere is serene, the bar, which seats about 12, is full.

The cooks at the Manna House soup kitchen in Baltimore routinely prepare low-salt meals, only to watch most of those sitting at the tables reach for the salt shaker. But that ingrained habit could be broken as the Baltimore Health Department teams up with Manna House and others in an educational program to curb consumption of the mineral so closely linked to cardiovascular disease, the nation's No. 1 killer and an especially intractable problem in poorer neighborhoods. Proponents of the effort say a modest reduction in salt consumption could save 700 lives here a year.

Salt: A World History, by Mark Kurlansky. Walker & Company. 484 pages. $28. Do we really know about salt? There it sits rather meekly on the dining table sharing a position with pepper. We reach for it to make our food taste better, even though we're cautioned against it, and some of us have recently found new respect for its pure form: fleur de sel. Perhaps some our sketchy memory of history might bring up the salt wars, or even Gandhi's salt marches. From earliest recorded history, salt was at the center of the world economy.

Sports medicine doctors used to recommend that athletes take salt tablets because they thought athletes would sweat so much they would develop a salt deficiency and pass out or even die. Today, doctors don't routinely recommend salt tablets.In the early 1960s, there was a very good distance runner named Tom Osler. He was a mediocre runner in the winter but won several national championships in races in hot weather. He attributed his extraordinary ability to race well in the heat to severely restricting salt in his diet.

Restaurants today throughout Maryland will help their customers shake the salt habit during the American Heart Association's "Great Salt-Out." Participating restaurants will remove salt shakers from their tables for the day to prove that food doesn't need excess salt to taste good. May is National High Blood Pressure Month."The Great Salt-Out reminds us that the first step in lowering high blood pressure in some people is taking the salt shaker off the table" according to Dr. Michael Kelemen, president of the Maryland affiliate of the American Heart Association.

"Salt," by Earl Lovelace. Persea Books. 260 pages. $22.95.In an ideal bookshop, something as fragrant as Trinidadian writer Earl Lovelace's newest novel would come boxed together with a packet of spices, a CD of West Indian music and a string hammock in which to swing as the author's melodious riffs and billows of language propel this lovely, passionate story on its gentle course.As it is, you can almost-almost-sniff the scents of Lovelace's home island in this busy and satisfying story - a "political" novel in which everyday human hubbub speaks as eloquently as any political oration.

The annual Pillsbury Bake-Off concluded today in Orlando, Fla.  The $1 million winner was annonced live on "The Martha Stewart Show. " Here is Christina Verrelli winning recipe for Pumpkin Ravioli with Salted Caramel Whipped Cream. Among the 100 finalists were two Baltimore area residents. Susann Studz competed in the Entertaining Appetizers category with Sushi-Style Crescent Crab Rolls , and Laura Majchrzak competed in the Sweet Treats category with her original Carrot Cake Tart recipe.

Here's a round-up of our week at Midnight Sun: •••• Very. Important. Band. Radiohead added dates to its upcoming tour, including a stop at Verizon Center on June 3. Tickets go on sale tomorrow. More details here . •••• Canadian country star Terri Clark performs Saturday and Sunday at Rams Head on Stage. She and I talked about losing her mother to cancer, leaving her major label and more, which you can read here . If you don't make it to Clark's shows, I recommend the Lemonheads show at the Ottobar, where you can hear Evan Dando and Co. perform "It's a Shame About Ray" in its entirety.

It's Wednesday night in Upper Fells Point and I'm sitting at the bar of the restaurant Salt. The restaurant has entered its chilled-out mode; dinner service ends in a half-hour at 10:30 p.m. A jazzy score - Charles Mingus and Roy Hargrove - murmurs in the background, and a mute TV is ignored in a far corner. A dozen or so green-colored lamps that look like a squadron of flying saucers give the bar a cool, moody glow. Though the atmosphere is serene, the bar, which seats about 12, is full.

In Baltimore, road crews were starting to wrap up salting and plowing operations, with most roads expected to be done by 11 a.m. “It's turning into a rain event,” said Adrienne Barnes, a spokeswoman for the city's Department of Transportation. She said crews will be working throughout the day and night, but they will be hitting targeted, problem areas, instead of cruising the streets. Barnes said that all primary and secondary roads were salted and plowed by this morning and as of 10 a.m. crews were responding to individual calls for service or complaints.

Staff meals, restaurants on January vacation the problem with asking restaurants to cut down on salt. An article in the Atlantic says that attempts by the Food and Drug Administration to coerce restaurants to cut down on salt are misguided at best. Restaurant meals account for a small amount of daily salt intake, says the article's author, an interventional cardiologist and professional chef. It's a good, provocative read. Bryan Voltaggio expains why one particular tattoo keeps getting him dirty looks from the Transportation Safety Authority ( Eater DC )

Five substances known as "bath salts" were added to the list of Schedule 1 Controlled Dangerous Substances list in Maryland through emergency regulations Tuesday. The move codified an order issued this summer by Dr. Joshua M. Sharfstein, secretary of the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, whose office had conducted a study and determined that the synthetic substances aren't yet widely available in Maryland but they could become a threat to health here. Sharfstein said the move gives law enforcement more power to enforce the earlier ban on bath salts, which can be inhaled, ingested, smoked or injected and can cause cardiac and circulatory problems as well as paranoia and psychosis for days or weeks.

Community leaders fear that a planned salt-storage barn at a prominent Towson corner will mar the appearance of a major entrance to the business district -- and is a misuse of prime property.They also question why the county bypassed its own review board, which recommended that the barn not be put at York Road and Bosley Avenue. The panel called the location "incompatible" with the neighborhood."The county ignored its own advisory panel," said Wayne Skinner, planning board member. "The issue is the general appearance of the whole area."

It's time to put our fear of salt in the proper perspective.The USDA recommendation that all Americans cut back on salt is again under fire. This time I hope the blow will be fatal.If you're surprised to hear this from a nutritionist, you probably don't know that many experts question the benefit of low-salt diets for healthy people. In fact, the subject has been debated for years, long before the recent report that people who eat the most salt live longer than people who eat the least.Yet "hold the salt" has remained the prevailing message, in spite of the fact that an estimated two-thirds of the population is not prone to hypertension caused by salt sensitivity.

I do love looking at Restaurant Week menus. Some of them are so lame! Salt Tavern in Upper Fells Point has a good one. It looks freshly considered -- although, that's a given at Salt, where Jason Ambrose and company regularly overhauls the menu. Also, the RW menu at Salt has more than the usual number of choices but is still focused and manageable. What do you think about Salt's RW menu -- if you haven't been for a while, does it tempt you to go back. First Course (choice of one)

Public health authorities in Maryland are moving to impose a ban, starting as early as Sept. 1, on the sale of synthetic drugs known as "bath salts. " After a six-week inquiry, Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, secretary of the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, on Thursday declared the drugs "dangerous" and asked for emergency regulations to add them to the state's Schedule 1 Controlled Dangerous Substances list. DHMH investigators also found that, while the drugs are dangerous, their availability in Maryland is "low.