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This recipe didn’t start out organic. I first saw it 27 or so years ago, when my babysitter made it with my oldest daughter. It was her favorite Easter candy, and it’s become a tradition among my girls to make it with Gigi, the awesomest babysitter of all time, who has been with me for 28 years.
Gigi first made the recipe after seeing these candies in the supermarket (she thinks it might have been a Russell Stover candy) and realizing she could make them herself for less money. Actually, Russell Stover still sells them! But of course, theirs are not

I can no longer say that not a single senior executive of one of the major nonprime lenders whose frauds hyper-inflated the housing bubble and caused the Great Recession has been convicted of his frauds. A single senior executive of one of the hundreds of fraudulent nonprime lenders was convicted yesterday, April 19, 2011. A jury found Lee Farkas, Chairman of the Board of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker (TBW), guilty of fraud. TBW was a large mortgage banking firm that made many nonprime loans, but the prosecution does not address the fraudulent nonprime

Do you know how many national parks there are?
394. Surprised? When we think ‘national parks,’ we often recall the spectacle of places like the Grand Canyon or Yosemite. While both of these places are truly awe-inspiring, they represent only a small fraction of the 84 million acres that make up our national parks. Our national parks come in many shapes and sizes, each with their own unique, compelling stories to tell, yet each shares a common undeniable fact — they all belong to

A Rabbi, a Muslim, and a Baptist preacher walk into a room. (Rim shot!) Yes, it is the setup for a joke, but not like you expect. Comedian/Rabbi Bob Alper, Muslim comic Azhar Usman, and myself, an ex-lawyer, turned Baptist minister and standup comedian are taking the stage for the Laugh in Peace Tour. Appearing everywhere from The World Bank Headquarters in Washington, DC to the Palestinian Fest in Houston, Texas, to Congregation Tifereth Israel in Columbus, Ohio, the goal of the tour is to build bridges and reconcile differences through

There are no quick fixes for the nation’s energy needs. Although oil plays a role in President Obama’s energy plan, the government must ensure proper oversight and planning before drilling, especially in such extreme, remote and fragile areas as the Arctic Ocean off of Alaska’s northern coast.
There are currently 3.8 million acres under lease to drilling companies in Alaska’s Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. There are considerable challenges in permitting responsible exploration on these tracts. A careful, precautionary approach is necessary to ensure we get it right.
These challenges include impacts to bowhead whales, walruses and polar bears, as well as to the Alaska Native villagers’ traditional way of life along the

A Reward as big as the European Union: all-you-can-eat mussels, plus an all-you-can-drink special offering from Sixpoint, at New York’s bastion of Belgian-ity, Petite Abeille. For just $24, you’ll feast on five kinds of lil’ shelled friends: white wine & celery-garlic Marinires, curry & crisp apple Rasta, creamy beer sauce & bacon essence Grand-Mre, creamy white wine & shallot Poulette, and roasted pepper eggplant Ratatouille — and you’ll get plenty of Belgian fries to sweeten the meal. To wash all that down? An exclusive (and unlimited) sampling of Brooklyn suds-masters Sixpoint’s latest flava, The Buzz. See if you can guess what it’ll give you.
The answer: a

As the world gets ever more portable, it’s important to find ways to store and transport your data and files. For the most part, this is broken down into two areas. External hard drives and USB Flash drives.
Once upon a time, the advantage of external hard drives was their storage capacity, since their size, while small enough to be portable, was a bit bulky. They of course remain much bigger and heavier than Flash drives, but they’ve come down impressively in

Among the foods that gardeners and gastronomes fawn over, yet others rarely even know, stands sorrel. An early spring green with brash lemony flavor that comes from an abundance of oxalic acid, it is a powerful addition to soups and sauces, and is tasty in salads when picked young.
Sorrel is classified in the genus Rumex, and its origins lie somewhere in Russia, where the Ural Mountains divide Asia from Europe. It was well known in Roman times, though not cultivated since it was plentiful in the wild. Culinary historians find it falling in and out of favor throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, and it seemed to do a curious dance over the English Channel as at times the French preferred it, then the English more so, then back

Last Sunday, I was in a crowd that is the essence of New York City — writers and bankers, shopkeepers and taxi drivers, Americans, ex-pats and immigrants. But this time, rather than horns blaring, cell phones demanding our attention, and people in game-face rushing to their next meetings, this mix of humanity that is New York sat completely still. 2,700 people had gathered together in Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall for the launch of I Meditate NY, a campaign to bring the rejuvenating benefits of meditation to New Yorkers. Posters were all over the city about this event, emails had been flying, and quite a buzz had been created on

I get the joke about Pom Wonderful Presents The Greatest Movie Ever Sold. I wish it was a little funnier – or more pointed. It’s provocative; it could be more so.
To be sure, Morgan Spurlock’s documentaries prove that he’s a showman, one with a social conscience and sly sense of humor.
So when he sets out to make a movie about the insidious and invasive nature of advertising in our modern life, you expect to learn something new – or see him do something semi-outrageous.
And he seems to: At one point, trying to woo the Pom Wonderful people to put a big chunk of money into his film by offering above-the-title sponsor credit, he brings them ideas for a commercial that he’d insert into the middle of his film (including one about the product’s effects on erectile dysfunction, that would have featured a shot of him with an

When thinking of topics to cover next, I realized that I hadn’t done anything on grass-fed beef. This method of rearing animals is one of the cornerstones of the sustainable food movement . It’s also one of the most highly contentious issues.
I myself am constantly in debate about whether meat should play a part in the future of eating at all.
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Coauthored by Kathryn Henderson, Ph.D., Director of School and Community Initiatives at the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at Yale University
As researchers and health professionals working with school districts and parents to support the development of healthful eating practices among children, we applaud nationwide efforts to improve school nutrition. These have included efforts to increase fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, and decrease fat, saturated fat, and added sugar. One source of added sugar that is a staple in school cafeterias is flavored milk. Promoting only unflavored milk is an effective way to reduce the added sugar children consume at

Today marks the first anniversary of the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the US. Unfortunately, most Americans, including our politicians, are suffering from collective amnesia about that tragic event that cost 11 lives, destroyed thousands of jobs, polluted thousands of square miles of the Gulf of Mexico, and damaged the economies of 5 states. As tragic as all those events were (some are still ongoing), media attention has moved on to the Royal Wedding, the next earthquake, and, of course, breathless coverage of American Idol. At the same time, our politicians, especially those in Washington, have used the lack of media attention to not only abdicate their responsibilities to make offshore drilling safer and are actively working to make it less safe, shocking as that

April is Stress Awareness Month. Let’s face it— You’re probably already ‘aware’ that stress is a daily part of your life. But consider this month a unique opportunity. Thirty days dedicated to educating yourself and perhaps finding a way to elevate your level of

To say goodbye can be accomplished with just a brief note left on the table, or by a telephone call where we say our final farewells. In the preparations to leave the country, at the end of a relationship, or of life itself, there are people who try to control the smallest details, draw up those limits that oblige the ones they leave behind to follow their path. Some leave slamming the door behind them, and others demand before taking off the great tribute they think they deserve. There are those who equitably distribute all their worldly goods, and also beings with so much power they change the constitution of a country so that no one can undo their work when they’re gone.
The preparations for the Sixth Congress of the Cuban Communist Party and its sessions in the Palace of Conventions have been like a great public requiem for Fidel

World War I spies engraved messages on toe-nails and used lemon juice to write invisible letters, classified documents released by the CIA reveal.

The six documents, amongst the oldest secret papers to be held by the agency, disclose a number of spying techniques.

The nearly century-old records include instructions "to suspect and examine every possible thing".

Recent advancements in technology have made it possible to release the documents, the CIA said.

One document suggests soaking a handkerchief, or any other starched substance, in nitrate, soda and starch, in order to make a portable invisible ink

One year ago, the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 people and pumped 4.9 million barrels of oil into the ocean in what was one of world's largest oil spills. The BBC's Andy Gallacher went to Alabama find out how residents there were doing.

The mayor of Bayou La Batre in Alabama is spoiling for a fight. Not a raised voices, finger-pointing type of affair but a full-on physical scrap. That is how frustrated Stan Wright, who has been in office for 11 years, has become.

"We was taught down here you have to fight for what you get," says Mr Wright, as he spits chewing tobacco into a brass pot sitting on his cluttered desk.

"I wanna get physical, I wanna beat the hell out of somebody," he continues, slamming his large hand down to make a point.

"You know you done said everything you can say, you done everything you can do, next thing there's the fight. But who you gonna fight when the federal government allows this company [BP] to come in and do this to us?"

Mr Wright's frustrations are echoed across this small fishing village, from the picturesque docks where the fishermen put white shrimp on ice, across to one of several seafood processing plants that are based here.
‘Universally despised’
"Nobody would believe that I'm not entitled to what I worked all my life for, generation after generation," says Dominick Ficarino, who owns and operates Dominick's Seafood.

Alabama shrimper's concerns over Deepwater Horizon's effects

Mr Ficarino, like many, is unhappy about a compensation process that is almost universally despised across the Gulf States.

"This boat here received $1,000 (£613)," says Mr Ficarino, pointing to one of his six shrimping vessels.

"A boat tied up next to it received $420,000 as an emergency

The excitement that has been building around the upcoming nuptials of Prince William and Kate certainly rivals the hoopla that preceded the wedding of William’s parents, Charles and Diana, nearly three decades ago. While that union proved to be a spectacular fiasco, only time will tell how this young couple will fare as husband and wife. On the one hand, they’ve had plenty of time to get to know one another, which bodes well for their happiness. Yet on the other hand, he’s

US authorities have unveiled an indictment against the owners of three of the world's biggest poker websites, throwing the young industry into turmoil.

Criminal and civil charges filed in New York have forced online poker sites PokerStars (based in the Isle of Man) and Full Tilt Poker (based in Alderney, in the Channel Islands), as well as Canada-based Absolute Poker, to stop doing business with Americans.

It is the latest upheaval for the industry, which over the last decade has grown from nothing into one that rakes in an estimated $5bn (£3.25bn) each year and is regulated in vastly different ways in countries around the world.

America is the biggest market, with up to a million online players. Gambling laws vary from state to state, but in 2006, the US federal government attempted to put the brakes on online poker with the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).

The UIGEA was meant to halt money transfers to online gaming sites, and several big poker sites, wary of running foul of the law, pulled out of the American market. However the three companies named in the indictment continued to welcome US-based customers.

Federal prosecutors in New York are seeking at least $3bn (£1.8bn) in civil money laundering penalties. If convicted, the 11 men named in the indictment face possible prison time and huge fines.

As a result of this latest scandal, the share prices of competing poker sites, which have already turned down business from US players, have experienced a significant jump.
‘Elaborate’ fraud
Prosecutors accuse the companies and alleged co-conspirators of concocting dozens of fake corporations – purportedly selling items such as clothing, golf clubs and pet food – to collect money from US players.
“Start QuoteThese defendants concocted an elaborate criminal fraud scheme…to assure the continued flow of billions in illegal gambling profits”
End QuotePreet BhararaManhattan US attorneyAfter American financial institutions got wise to the trick, the indictment alleges, the companies decided to change

Fans have reacted angrily at the axing of two long-running daytime soap operas.

All My Children and One Life to Live have been mainstays of ABC's daytime schedule for more than 40 years.

But, according to the network, viewers are looking for different types of programming.

One major advertiser has reacted to the news by pulling pulled its commercials from the channel.

But the apparent outrage is unlikely to result in a change in heart by ABC, which will air only one daytime drama, General Hospital, in the future.

"It's a combination of shifting tastes and cost," says Kim Masters, editor-at-large with The Hollywood Reporter and host of The Business on KCRW radio.
Agnes Nixon (left) created All My Children and One Life to Live
"I think we might be seeing the end of an era. Ratings for these shows are dropping, especially amongst younger female viewers – and making reality shows is cheaper."

The escalating cost of producing drama, which involves paying actors, writers and scores of other workers behind the scenes, has long sounded the death knell for daytime soaps.

Coupled with the fact that audiences appear to me more enthralled by the dramas that play out on reality shows, one of television's original formats is left gasping for its last

Looking back on this year’s edition of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival — that three-day extravaganza in Indio, California, which drew to a close on Sunday — one will perhaps recall Kanye West, riding onstage on a mechanical arm and then bursting into tears during his rendition of “Hey Mama.” Or maybe one will recollect the seemingly infinite array of flowing knitwear, oversize sunglasses, and floppy hats sported by “High School Musical” sweetheart Vanessa Hudgens, who spent the weekend cavorting all over the Empire Polo Fields. But while the music and the various bright-eyed, vintage-sporting starlets have remained a constant feature of the festival over the years, one notable change for in the event could be found in the festival’s art offerings, which got a tech-savvy update thanks to Intel and Vice.
Chris Milk’s “Summer Into Dust” LED balloons during Arcade Fire’s Coachella set. / Courtesy AFP/Getty Images
While art at the desert affair is usually marked by a DIY, folksy aesthetic — with sculptures imported from Burning Man for the occasion — this year the technology giant teamed up with nefarious-activity-loving publication to deploy their Creators Project, showcasing artists and filmmakers who engage with digital technology. The result was a series of art installations around the festival grounds, as well as enlivening main-stage performances with light shows and futuristic effects courtesy of the U.K.’s United Visual Artists.
Perhaps the most popular of these concert-enhancing art collaborations was “Summer Into Dust,” for which American director Chris Milk arranged to have white balloons (inside of which

Mountaineer and best-selling American author Greg Mortenson inspired millions with his tale of building schools for girls in the remotest reaches of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

But he has found himself in the midst of a media frenzy after claims in a CBS 60 Minutes programme that his account is riddled with inaccuracies.

The report dissected the financial affairs of the Central Asia Institute (CAI), the charity he set up, but it also raised serious doubts over whether the organisation really did build all the schools it has taken credit for. Mr Mortenson denies the allegations.

The BBC investigated a few areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan to test some of the central claims made in the programme.

The mountainous Gilgit-Baltistan region in northern Pakistan hosts areas of breathtaking beauty and profound deprivation. It was here, in 1993, that Mr Mortenson says he stumbled upon the remote, farming community of Korphe, whose hospitality sparked off a school-building programme across Central Asia.

This story is disputed by 60 Minutes and his school-building record is also questioned.

But Imran Nadeem Shigri, a politician from the neighbouring Shigar valley in Baltistan, where the CAI says it has established a number of schools, says "he did some pretty useful work in our region and brought in some much needed funds."

Mr Shigri is not a Mortenson cheerleader – he is a man Mr Mortenson considered to be an opponent and allied to a cleric who issued a fatwa against Mr Mortenson at the start of his school-building mission.

Despite this, Mr Shigri says that the CAI has built even more schools in the region than it shows on its website. He is conducting a government survey of CAI schools in the area and thinks this is because it was only counting schools it managed, not those it helped build.

"During my tenure in the government, we took over at least seven CAI schools. The buildings and the equipment was there. The government provided the teachers. It was good for the government as it got free building and equipment. It was good for the CAI as their projects were made viable," he

Firefighters in the US state of Texas are battling to contain wildfires which have burned more than one million acres in the past fortnight.

One official told CNN fires were burning "from border to border", with some covering more than 100,000 acres.

Long-term drought, high temperatures and gusting winds have created ideal conditions for the fires to spread.

Several towns have been evacuated and flames are now close to Fort Worth, one of the state's largest cities.
“Start QuoteThe fire’s coming at Possum Kingdom Lake from just about every angle at any given time”
End QuoteLee McNeelyTexas Forest ServiceThe Texas Forest Service said it had responded to 11 new fires on Tuesday, in addition to the scores already burning across the state. Nearly 200 homes are reported to have been destroyed.

Planes have been dropping water and fire retardant on the burning areas while firefighters have been dousing threatened