Are you the pork “Crock-Star” of your home kitchen? You could win $5,000.

From August 9 through September 27 (Monday), visit TheOtherWhiteMeat.com to submit an original slow-cooking pork recipe in the first-ever “Search for America’s Pork ‘Crock-Star” contest.

Five winners will win a trip to New York City to compete at Crocktoberfest in October. In addition to rubbing elbows with celebrity mom Candace Cameron Bure and winner of Top Chef – Season 5 Hosea Rosenberg, one lucky entrant will walk away with the $5,000 grand prize.

There are other rules, like the recipe should be original, and include eight ingredients or less. Check out the rules and enter your family’s favorite dish.

Good luck!

Carvel ice cream stores are giving away free scoops of their Swiss Miss chocolate ice cream, Thursday only.

The hot-cocoa flavored scoop is to thank everyone for their patronage.

Fine print: Only at participating stores, the offer can’t be combined with any other offer, and the free scoop is 3 oz.

Come meet folks you know and some new people from Twitter on Oct. 13 at Sky 309.

Hosted by @pbpost, @aGuyonClematis and @roxyspub, you can expect a free buffet with purchase of a drink.

Some of the giveaways include:
Uncle Louie G on Clematis (on Twitter: @UncleLouieG_wpb) will be raffling off a $20 gift certificate for ice cream at the Clematis Street stand
Palm Beach Segway Tours (on Twitter: @pbsegway) will be raffling off 2 tours.
Kaffee’s Garden Spa (on Twitter: @dayspama) Will be giving away gift certificates for luxurious spa treatments.

Come eat, drink and chat under the stars with old and new friends at 309 Clematis Street, West Palm Beach.

There will be drink specials and a few surprises. The twitter hashtag is #ctwpb7

For more information, RSVP here. (Folks who RSVP get snazzy name tags at the door!)

If that RSVP button doesn’t work click here to RSVP.

More: Check out new, healthier prepackaged fare for lunchboxes | Add pizazz to your homemade sandwiches

As the morning bells ring in classrooms all across Palm Beach County this week, they signal the promise of a new year for schoolchildren, of new books, new lessons, new friends. For those of us who pack their lunches, however, the start of the school year brings the same old pop quiz: How does one fill that empty lunchbox quickly, creatively, frugally and healthfully?

We’ve got ideas, tips and simple recipes for lunches the kids will

love – so much, in fact, they’ll give you an A.

But as you stock up on your ingredients, there’s one thing you can do to make your mornings easier – include your kids in the planning and prepping stages of your lunchbox-filling task. It’s their lunch, after all!

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Hatcher Mango Hill has ripe mangoes ready.

There’s been a bit of a shortage of local mangoes this year, because of a problem with med flies. But Hatcher’s grove, which has been in business since the 1940s near I-95 at Hypoluxo (1908 Hypoluxo Road, Lantana), hasn’t had any problems.

Marilynn Hatcher reports a bumper crop.

You can’t get Hatcher mangoes in stores, though. You go to their website, hatchermangohill.com and put your name on their waiting list. When your name comes up, they’ll call you and set up a time when you can come pick them up. They also ship.

Hatcher mangoes are the biggest mangoes I’ve ever seen. They’re also sweet and never stringy.

Read more about Hatcher Mango Hill here.
Marilynn offers this recipe for mango ice cream in her book, Hatcher’s Mango Thrills.

RIVER’S EDGE MANGO ICE CREAM

1 Hatcher mango, sliced
2 cups sugar
1 can (10 oz.) sweetened condensed milk
1 can (12 oz.) evaporated milk
4 eggs
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 pint whipping cream
1% milk, as needed

Place mango slices in container of an electric blender; cover and process until smooth. Set aside. Combine sugar, condensed milk, evaporated milk, eggs, cornstarch, and vanilla in a bowl, and mix well. Pour mixture into the freezer can of a 1-gallon ice cream freezer. Add mango puree to freezer can mixture and pour in enough 1% milk to bring mixture to the full line on the freezer can. Freeze according to manufacturer’s instructions.

West Palm Beach’s Kona Grill in CityPlace is hosting a foursquare Swarm Badge Party.

You can try their Stinger sushi roll, meet fellow foursquare and Twitter users, and be part of the swarm Wednesday, August 18th.

The Swarm party will take place from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. local time at each of the 24 Kona Grills nationwide. Guests are encouraged to visit the restaurant and check-in on foursquare, in hopes of earning their “Swarm Badge”. The coveted Swarm Badge is awarded to users who check in at a location where more than 50 other users are checked in at the same time.

At each Kona Grill, the current foursquare Mayor will receive a free Stinger Roll. In the future, each active Mayor will earn a free sushi roll or appetizer with purchase anytime they visit their Kona Grill.

For more information: www.konagrill.com

Twitter: www.twitter.com/konagrill

Facebook: www.facebook.com/konagrill

Happy Lasagna Day!

BRIO Tuscan Grille at The Gardens Mall is celebrating “National Lasagna Day” today (Thursday, July 29) by offering its full-size Lasagna Bolognese Al Forno for half price ($8.12 for lunch, $8.47 for dinner) at all of its locations nationwide.

Brio is at 3101 PGA Blvd in Palm Beach Gardens.

Call the restaurant at 561-622-0491 or visit www.brioitalian.com for details or reservations.

The sizzle

TASTES LIKE HOMEMADE (we promise). Cathy Beck of West Palm Beach and Denise Garling of Palm Beach Gardens have whipped up ready-to-bake cookie dough that is way tastier than any store-bought variety. DB’s BatterUp Cookie Dough (made in Lantana) comes in 32-ounce tubs, with flavors including Chocolate Mocha Chip, Peanut Butter, Mint Chip, Oatmeal Raisin Deluxe and Coconut Macaroons and makes about three dozen cookies.

At $24.99, these cookies may not be a budget choice for the kids’ bake sale, but served warm from the oven they’re worth their weight in gold. The ingredients are top-quality, with no unpronounceable preservatives or chemicals.

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Today Wendy’s launches a lines of four new salads that replace their current $4 lineup.

The new $5.99 salads: apple pecan chicken, BLT cobb, spicy chicken Caesar and baja, have fancier ingredients, tango and lolla rossa lettuce, cranberries, pico de gallo and Asiago cheese.

The previous Garden Sensations line launched in 2002.

The company also is testing breakfast again across the country. Chief Marketing Officer Ken Calwell says he expects to know more about moving into that growing restaurant segment as early as later this year.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Have you noticed? Yogurt is taking over the dairy aisle at your local grocery store.

There’s yogurt made from sheep’s milk, goat’s milk, coconut milk, rice milk and soy milk.

There’s Icelandic, Greek, and some thickened with gelatin.

Some have active cultures, added fiber, added whey protein, less fat or less sugar. We taste-tested lots of yogurts. Check out the surprising results

Yogurt, long recognized as a healthy food, is made by adding bacterial cultures to milk.
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