| Welcoming Holiday Guests Opens the Door to New Home Injury Risks
WASHINGTON, Nov. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- As the holiday countdown begins, many families are busy planning menus for festive feasts and preparing their homes for holiday guests. In fact, a recent study by the national nonprofit Home Safety Council found that more than 40 percent of adults plan to host friends and relatives in their homes this winter season. The Home Safety Council is offering tips and advice to help families ensure safe and happy holiday visits. "Opening our homes to holiday visitors is a wonderful way to show friends and family how much we care. Along with the pleasures of cooking meals and preparing a festive home environment, we're also responsible for keeping our guests safe," said Meri-K Appy, Home Safety Council president. "By taking a few simple safety steps before guests arrive, hosts can help ensure everyone's holiday meals and visits are happy and injury-free." "Get a Taste" for Safety According to the Home Safety Council's new survey, nearly two-thirds of adults (65 percent) plan to cook holiday meals this winter season.
Big pants save the day
A family home was saved from burning down when a pair of giant knickers were used to put out a fire. Jenny Marsey's size 18-20 cotton pants were grabbed to cover a frying pan fire at her home in Hartlepool. Her son and nephew were trying to fry some bread when the blaze broke out, reports the BBC. They grabbed the knickers from a pile of washing, doused them in water, and threw them over the fire. Mrs Marsey, 53, said: "My 4.99 parachute knickers have come in handy for something. We've had a good laugh that they were a bit like a fire blanket." Her son John and his cousin Darren, 23, were cooking, when they went to answer a knock at the door, only to return to a blazing kitchen. Mrs Marsey said: "When they found the pan on fire they did what most people do and panicked.
Michelin-starred Manresa helps make Los Gatos a gourmet getaway
To prepare a Bay Area foodie getaway, pick a scenic Wine Country village. Add a multi-Michelin-starred restaurant, sprinkle with gourmet stores, and finish with a stylish boutique hotel to sleep off the evening's excess. If you filed this recipe under "Yountville," home to three-starred French Laundry, or "Healdsburg," where two-starred Cyrus shines, you clearly know what's cooking. But you'll also find the same ingredients south of San Francisco - where you won't have to spend quite as much to enjoy them, or contend with quite as many fellow palates. Surrounded by the wineries of the Santa Cruz Mountains, downtown Los Gatos boasts a Michelin two-star restaurant - the rating means it's "worth a detour"- in Manresa, a fixture on The Chronicle's Top 100 list. And as I recently discovered on an indulgent weekend, the pedestrian-friendly, half-mile stretch of Santa Cruz Avenue just off Highway 17 is a veritable larder of epicurean establishments in all price ranges.
The skinny on soul food
This story was originally published in February 2006. a popular soul food restaurant for a meal and it's a good bet you'll be greeted by a selection of dishes so mouthwatering one taste will, in the vernacular of Southern folks, "make you wanna slap your mama." Spicy fried catfish, buttery candied yams, gooey macaroni and cheese and tender barbecued ribs are the stuff of Southern cooking legend. They blanket your palate with down-home comfort and warm your insides. But these dishes can also add thick layers to your hips, thighs and midsection if you over-indulge. The curious thing, however, is while such high-calorie delights have in recent years become the poster children for soul food cuisine, traditional soul food -- the kind you used to find on the tables of Southern, African-American families every day -- is very much rooted in the land.
In brief: Hot licks
Anchorage resident Laurie Helen Constantino has written a cookbook for those who would like to learn Mediterranean cooking. The 200-plus-page book, "Tastes Like Home," is chock-full of recipes handed down through the generations, she says. Proceeds will go toward the building fund of Holy Transfiguration Greek Orthodox Church. For information or to buy a copy, go to www. transfiguration.ak.goarch.org or call 344-0190. Holiday cooking questions answered The University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension has set up a toll-free food safety and preservation hot line to answer questions regarding cooking for the coming holidays. The number is 1-888-823-3663, or home cooks can visit the Cooperative Extention Web site at www. alaska.edu/uaf/ces/hhfd. Click on Ask an Expert to e-mail your questions.
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