Meal

In our ever-changing culture, with its constantly adapting language, some words and phrases come to assume lives of their own, to convey a feeling or idea rather than any exact meaning. Sunday dinner is one example, in that it conjures up a vision of a special meal for any time, not one that's limited to a Sunday. And it perfectly describes this month's menu for Affordable Feast, which is luxurious, delicious and festive. All ingredients are available in local supermarkets, preparation is guaranteed not to stress the cook, and results are sure to please everyone.

At a dinner visit to Michael's, we could have wished for company. With just two other tables of diners and a few stragglers at the bar, the white-walled, long, narrow dining room of the new Chestnut Street restaurant seemed cold and lonely. But what a difference the time of day makes. At noon, a few days later, Michael's business was booming, and the noise from the piano and the crowd crammed in around us made for a party atmosphere in the long, high-ceilinged room. The booming lunch business should have come as no surprise.

They were there to feed the hungry, and nobody came. Or very few, anyway. Four people eating tuna casserole recently at the Church of the Holy Trinity in West Chester were outnumbered by about a dozen volunteers. Yet those who came to eat were happy for the warm food and kind attention. "I remember having to go to assistance in 1980, and I was humiliated," said Sarah Fagan, 52, who was eating dinner with her friend, Catherine Dulin, 65. "But in West Chester, they are a respecter of persons.

MY OWN MEALS. My Kind of Chicken, Chicken Please, My Favorite Pasta, My Turkey Meatballs, and My Meatballs and Shells. $1.99 to $2.49 per 8- to 8.5- ounce shelf-stable pouch. BONNIE: My Own Meals is the healthiest of the new meals made especially for kids. All the entrees are made without artificial colors or flavors, preservatives or additives. Each of the five shelf-stable entrees is moderate in sodium, fat and calories. The fat ranges from 16 percent of calories (Chicken Please)

There was a time when proper American meals were always hot meals, no matter what the temperature in the yard, in the kitchen or at the dining table. Consequently, summer eating often was a chore for everyone, particularly for the cook. Thankfully, that time is just a memory. And thankfully, too, our concept of cold food has progressed from simple deli cold cuts and potato salad to meals that have excellent nutritional as well as aesthetic appeal. In the process, an entirely new hot-weather cuisine consisting of good food, easy on bulk and heat, has been created.

If there is anything good to be said about winter, particularly when it's bitter cold, snowing and generally miserable, it's that it makes being at home seem so nice. There are shelter and warmth there, and there is comfort to be found, especially when everybody's favorite room, the kitchen, is giving off tantalizing smells. Aroma, in fact, is one of the key elements in the four-person, garlicky, Italian feast we offer this month. It contains luxury ingredients, hearty pasta and Mediterranean touches in easy-to-fix dishes, with nearly all shopping done in local supermarkets.

Restaurant reviewers worry about being recognized. So when our lunch server at Rembrandt's said, "Don't I know you . . .," I began to cringe - before I realized that she was talking to my review partner, Channel 17 interviewer Dorie Lenz. It was Lenz's first visit to the Art Museum-area restaurant. I'm betting it won't be the last. Her entree, we agreed, was a light, healthful combination in which each ingredient had been given careful attention. The entree's base was angel-hair pasta.

If you're into extra-special and extra-extra-special Valentine's Day dinners - as in extra work and fantasy menus - you'll appreciate the following suggestions from a few local chefs. Their versions of romantic food are sure to spark your own imagination. Most of these professional chefs won't be brewing their aphrodisiac love potions on Valentine's Day - because they'll be working. But that won't stop any of them from whipping up mouth-watering meals on their days off. How do the pros define a romantic meal?

As America prepares for a long Independence Day weekend of picnics, parties and cookouts, Gary Heidnik prepares for his final get-away and his last meal. The choices are many, but the fare is feeble. Heidnik, a convicted killer of two women imprisoned more than a decade and slated to die Tuesday night, gets to pick from among 37 "entrees," 13 different potato dishes, 16 soups, 22 veggies and 12 desserts. There is nothing fancy, no lobster bisque, no broiled scallops, no champagne, not even a beer.

Got a spare room? Live in or near Pennsauken? If you do, Erick Long wants to talk with you. Soon. Long is one of about 160 members of Up With People, the 25-year-old nonprofit group of young performers from around the globe whose stage shows offer messages about the benefits of international understanding and community activism. As part of Pennsauken's centennial celebration, Up With People will perform Friday and Saturday at Pennsauken High School. And the group, which is making its third visit to the township, needs some help while in Pennsauken from Thursday to Sunday.

A vast repast will unfold on Independence Mall Oct. 5, a product of the Mural Arts Program's effort to rethink its mission, program director Jane Golden said Thursday. Part of a months-long effort called "What We Sow," the event - "70x7 The Meal, act XXXIV" - is a collaboration between Mural Arts and the Paris-based artists Lucy and Jorge Orta. It involves a free communal meal created by star chef Marc Vetri involving heirloom vegetables. Golden said nearly a thousand people will dine at a table decorated by the Ortas' tableware and runners.

Two might not be able to eat as cheaply as one in a restaurant, but they'll eat as well, if not better, judging from these dishes local restaurants serve for deuces only. (Prices for two unless otherwise indicated.) The Dandelion offers roast beef and Yorkshire pudding for two on Sundays, $56. thedandelionpub.com. Chifa lets you share the Chinese 5-Spice Pork, served with house hoisin, sriracha, pickles, wasabi slaw, togarashi mayo, lettuce and lime. Grab a flour tortilla and wrap it up for $31. chifarestaurant.com.

IT'S no accident that Lady fell hard for the Tramp over a shared plate of linguine in the classic Disney movie. The very act of nibbling pour deux can be enough to get a body in the mood for romance. Although Valentine's Day is one reason to canoodle with your favorite dining partner, chefs around town are hip to the aphrodisiac power of shared deliciousness any time of year. "It's sexy to share," said Patrice Rames, chef/owner at Bistro St. Tropez in Center City. He offers a dessert duo meant for two, an airy Gran Marnier souffle and a chocolat chaud , or molten chocolate cake (see recipe)

SOME BOOK CLUBS are serious affairs, intent on intellectual discourse and literary delving. The one I belong to is not of that ilk. Not that the friends and neighbors in my Belmont Hills club aren't smarty-pants material. It's just that our club is as much about feeding our souls and our bellies as it is about feeding our intellects. We're not really sure how it started, but most months, our meeting is a potluck inspired by something we are reading. Our discussion flows along with wine and herbal tea. Roasted vegetables and lovingly prepared comfort foods fuel our musings.

WHEN IT'S cold outside, there's nothing like coming home to the warming aroma of a slow-cooked meal, a simmering mixture subtly blending the flavors and colors of potatoes, carrots, beans, rice, squash, tomatoes, corn, mushrooms, onions, spices . . . But wait, where's the meat? A fair question: After all, just about everybody who was around in the 1970s recalls that tenderizing and flavor-boosting cheap cuts of meat was a main selling point in slow cookers' original launch and rise.

  As Lucinda Bromwyn Duncalfe powered through a 10-minute pitch to an investor group earlier this month, seeking $1 million for her new healthy-meals delivery company, her audience breakfasted on low-nutrition, high-carbs bagels. They didn't come from Duncalfe! Her idea of acceptable morning fare, which her company, Real Food Works, plans to begin offering in January, includes wheat berry porridge with pomegranate and tofu-based vegetable frittata with spinach and shiitake mushrooms.

YOU THINK you're eating lots - or are gonna eat lots - this holiday season? Chances are, you ain't got nuthin' on the 28 diners who took part in a 10-hour, 40-dish feast at South Philly's Le Virtù Sunday. You read that right: 40 dishes. Four-oh. And 10 hours. One-oh. (Well, for some people. Not everyone who came and saw also conquered.) Here's how it went down. A little before 2 p.m. at the drizzly end of last weekend, many Philadelphians, some suburbanites, a few out-of-towners filed into the East Passyunk Avenue restaurant with empty stomachs, elastic waistbands and varying degrees of anticipation.

As part of the city's effort to better coordinate outdoor free meals for homeless people, Mayor Nutter has created the Philadelphia Food Access Collaborative, which includes many groups that give food to people in need. The collaborative grew out of a yearlong attempt to bridge the gap between groups that feed homeless people on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and those that want them to move indoors. Bill Golderer, the convening minister of Broad Street Ministry, said the collaborative was "positioned to drive our city toward new solutions to this vexing problem.

NEW YORK - Victims of Superstorm Sandy in New York and elsewhere in the Northeast were comforted Thursday by kinder weather, free holiday meals and - for some - front-row seats to the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. "It means a lot," said Karen Panetta, of the hard-hit Broad Channel section of Queens, as she sat in a special viewing section set aside for New Yorkers displaced by the storm. "We're thankful to be here and actually be a family and to feel like life's a little normal today," she said.

Trained cooking aides, online information, and hotline recordings are available to answer queries and help resolve problems that arise during Thanksgiving meal preparation. Butterball Turkey Talk Line: 1-800-288-8372. Experts answer live questions during the month of November and December or www.butterball.com . USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline: 1-800-535-4555 Food specialists address questions of food prep and safety, or go to www.foodsafety.gov .