From the Editors

In the finest Jersey Shore tradition of bizarre behavior, a Lavallette man has inspired a media frenzy by scaling the iconic tattered remains of the Jet Star Roller Coaster in Seaside Heights....
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New Jerseyans turn up in all the best places these days, including Forbes magazine’s annual 30 Under 30 list of top men and women who have excelled in their various walks of life....
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Making a Racket in Warren

December 11, 2012

The top 10 professional racquetball players in the world will be among those competing this weekend at the New Jersey Open to win up to $20,000 in prize money....
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Go, Katie, Go!

December 10, 2012

Her enthusiasm is boundless—and contagious. “I lost my voice from screaming so much,” Bernardsville native Katie Meyler told us after her foundation, More Than Me, won $1 million during Chase Bank’s American Giving Awards, televised on NBC Saturday night. She said More Than Me will use the money to build a boarding school for impoverished girls in Liberia....
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The Prudential Center’s Devils Care Foundation is enlisting the help of the Rolling Stones to raise money for Hurricane Sandy relief efforts. You too can help¬–and maybe win a pair of Stones tickets in the process....
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Chris Young, principal co-author with Nathan Myhrvold of Modernist Cuisine—that groundbreaking, 2,438-page, innovative bible of cooking in the 21st century—was in Princeton recently. Over coffee at Small World, we talked about ChefSteps, the new free online culinary school he has launched with fellow Modernist Cuisine alums. Its step-by-step lessons incorporate video, photography and precise instructions that go far beyond what any physical book can offer. ...
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Dirty Work Down the Shore

November 20, 2012

Immense piles of garbage. Mold-remediation trucks. Boarded windows. Police roadblocks. These are the sights that greeted us on Saturday as we drove into the waterfront borough of Highlands on a mission to help with the post-Sandy cleanup....
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With all due respect to the green bean casserole, it and other traditional holiday sides are fat-and-carb bombs that cause many eager eaters nodding off on the couch after dinner. Here are some lighter—and, I think, tastier—sides to serve with the holiday gobbler or ham....
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Turkey Drive in Gladstone

November 15, 2012

Thanksgiving is next week and the need to help others is more crucial than ever—especially in our state’s post-Sandy condition. ...
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The blossoming of downtown Jersey City as a hip dining destination can be traced to the opening of Marco & Pepe, across the street from City Hall, shortly after the trauma of 9/11. The chef, one Ian Topper-Kapitan, was turning out a new kind of freewheeling casual food the likes of which, at that time, you had to go to Lower Manhattan to experience. He would continue to be a force in the neighborhood (near the Hudson River) for the next decade. Then he disappeared. Tonight I got a call from him....
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The Kellogg’s Tour of Gymnastics Champions brought 2008 All Around Gold Medalist Liukin and a cast of 11 fellow Olympians… Read the rest

In the vast parking lot of the Whole Foods and K-Mart mall in West Orange, a convoy of out-of-state utility trucks rest while their crews presumably do the same......
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Sometimes it takes a hurricane—or “Frankenstorm”—to remind us that cell phones and Wi-Fi and even cable TV are luxuries....
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While on her way to the booth to cast a vote, our Mendham-based style editor ran into the town's most famous resident—Governor Chris Christie, who had his daughter in tow to exercise our nation's most important franchise. The Governor had a few words to say about the value of the democratic process....
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The morning before Hurricane Sandy, my husband and I debated staying home in Hoboken. We had evacuated for Tropical Storm Irene last year, but that proved unnecessary. This time around, we didn’t want to panic....
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A quick spin around Montclair Tuesday afternoon, surveying the damage....
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If someone asks you, “What part of New Jersey are you from?” you’ve probably got a stock answer—town, county, North/South Jersey, the Shore. But those are all staid responses lacking any je ne sais quoi. If you want to inject a little cachet into that response, try some new terms—“New Jersey’s Wealth Belt,” or “the Northern Exurban Fringe.” ...
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If all the bars and restaurants in Hoboken were a family, Helmers’ would be the patriarch. The German restaurant has been part of the local fabric for more than 70 years, surviving the city’s ups and downs. It is also part of my family’s history, and without it, I am not sure we would have made it in this country....
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Earlier this month, at Mountain Ridge Country Club in West Caldwell, Paul Simson, 61, defeated a man six years his junior to win the USGA's Senior Amateur National Championship for the second time in three years. Yet last spring, Simson--who grew up in Chatham, graduated from Pingry (was inducted into the school's Sports Hall of Fame in 2011) and met (and later married) his wife just off the 9th green of Fairmount Country Club in Chatham--wondered whether he would be able to walk this season without pain, let alone swing a golf club....
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No matter who ends up in the White House after the November 6 election, the campaign already is a winner for the three Montclair High School students who gained national attention when they called for a female moderator for the presidential debates....
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