Bacon mayonnaise: For the ultimate BLT. Make your own. The recipe, in painstaking detail, is at Skillet Doux:

BLT with Bacon Mayo Makes doctors angry (and 2 sandwiches)

In a post about Deconstructing Garlic, blogger Dominic Armato reports the results of his scientific kitchen test comparing minced, crushed and microplaned garlic, and found mincing makes a far superior tomato sauce.

Upgrade: I really like the Del's Lemonade made with Splenda that comes in cartons at the grocery store, but it's a little sweet for my taste. I dose it with key lime juice, and it gets an edge.

You can use lemonade to tame a key lime martini, turning it into a less potent mixed drink.

The good life in Havana: Cuba's green revolution. Originally published in the U.K. Independent, this could be news to use as gas prices drive the cost of faraway food out of reach:

With no subsidies and limited resources, the Cuban regime took the decision to look inwards. Ceasing to organise its economy around the export of "tropical products" and the import of food, it decided to maximise food production. By necessity, this meant a back-to-basics approach; with no Soviet oil for tractors or fertiliser it turned to oxen, with no Soviet oil for its fertiliser and pesticide it turned to natural compost and the production of natural pesticides and beneficial insects. It is estimated that more than 200 locally based centres specialising in biopesticides annually produce 200 tons of verticillium to control whitefly, and 800 tons of beaveria sprays to control beetles.

Professor Jules Pretty, of the University of Essex's department of biological sciences, recently wrote: "Cut banana stems baited with honey to attract ants are placed in sweet potato fields and have led to control of sweet potato weevil. There are 170 vermicompost centres, the annual production of which has grown from 3 to 9,300 tons. Crop rotations, green maturing, intercropping and soil conservation have all been incorporated into polyculture farming."

Remarkably, this organic revolution has worked. Annual calorie intake now stands at about 2,600 a day, while UNFAO estimates that the percentage of the population considered undernourished fell from 8 per cent in 1990-2 to about 3 per cent in 2000-2. Cuba's infant mortality rate is lower than that of the US, while at 77 years life expectancy is the same.

Everyone appears to agree that this new, organic approach is far more efficient than the previous Soviet model that stressed production at all costs. Fernando Funes, head of the national Pasture and Forage Research Unit, told Harper's magazine: "In that old system it took 10 or 15 units of energy to produce one unit of food energy. At first we did not care about economics, [but] we were realising just how inefficient it was."

Garden blog: High-Altitude Gardening is a stylish blog from Park City, Utah. The author: "Kate is a certified master gardener who wishes she lived in zone 7 intead of zone 5."

And she's never had hollyhock rust. I love the old-fashioned single-flowered hollyhocks, but they always succumb for me.

I can't get to the Garden Blogs list from home, but I do want to highlight some new entries this weekend. I'll blog them first, and add them to the big list Tuesday.

Second life: At the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a plain deal indeed:

Under terms of the buyout program, editorial and business office workers age 50 and over with at least 20 years’ service will receive a payment equal to 2-1/2 years’ salary and “other compensation,” payable in a lump sum or other methods.

Plain Dealer employees under age 50 with less than 20 years’ experience can receive two weeks’ pay for each year of service at the paper. Employees who take the buyout will keep certain benefits, such as the ability to continue in a 401(k) plan and continued health care coverage.

Updated: Here are more details, from the Plain Dealer's business blog (light registration required):

Details of the buyout offers (for employees covered by union contracts)

Age 50 or more, at least 20 years of service as of Dec. 31, 2006
-- Value of 2-1/2 years' pay, in lump sum, monthly payments, as post-tax amount for purchase of health-care coverage, or combination of above.
-- Value of 2-1/2 years' health-care coverage, as continuation of current coverage or for post-65 retiree health care.
-- Ability to continue in 401(k) plan.
-- Outplacement services if requested.

Under 50 and/or less than 20 years' service
-- Value of 2 weeks' pay for each full year of service, in lump sum, monthly payments, post-tax amounts to buy continued health-care coverage or retiree health-care coverage, or combination of above.
-- Value of 2 weeks' health-care coverage for each full year of service, to continue health-care coverage or use for post-65 retiree health care.
-- Ability to continue in 401(k).
-- Outplacement services if requested.

There are some differences in the offer to non-union employees.

Lost it: I just lost the rest of this blog item, a Patriots wrap.

Phooey.

Just like the game.

AP found Pats coach Bill Belichick during the second half.

Trust me: Two photos worth looking at.