WhiteBoard News for Saturday, January 11, 2003

New York, New York (AP):

And yes, it comes with fries. 

A 20-ounce burger fashioned from ultra-tender Kobe beef debuted this week at the landmark Old Homestead restaurant. At $41, it is the most expensive hamburger in the city. 

It is the first time the 135-year-old steakhouse has ever put a burger on its menu. The restaurant bills it as "The World's Most Decadent Hamburger." 

"This is not about price," restaurant owner Marc Sherry said Friday, when the restaurant sold nearly 200 of the new burgers. "This is an event." 

The burgers debuted on Tuesday. Among the first to try the burger: "Sopranos" star James Gandolfini and New York Mets star Mike Piazza, Sherry said. 

Kobe beef, imported from Japan, comes from cattle raised on beer and massaged daily to make the meat soft and succulent. 

The burger, which has a piece of herb butter in the middle of each patty, comes on a special roll with exotic mushrooms and microgreens shredded baby lettuce. 

Put away the Heinz. The burger comes with a homemade ketchup, mustard or horseradish sauce. 

"And it's served," Sherry added, "with our classic garlic shoestring fries." 
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Dudley, England (Ananova):

Zoo bosses say they are considering issuing their keepers with gas masks after a group of odorous orang-utans developed a real taste for sprouts.

The apes have left keepers at Dudley Zoo gasping for air after munching on out-of-date supplies of the festive vegetable.

The primates have been causing a stink after a local supermarkets donated a bumper post-Christmas batch of sprouts to the Black Country zoo.

Monkey keeper James Harper told the BBC: "Orang-utans are windy animals but because of all the brussels sprouts they are eating there is quite a pong around here at the moment."

He added: "Whoever gets the short straw gets to muck them out."
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Harbin, China (Xinhua):

A Chinese man has broken his own record by standing naked in sub-zero Siberian winter conditions for four hours.

Jin Songhao, a 48-year-old man from China's north-eastern Heilongjiang province, broke his record in the provincial capital of Harbin.

The Xinhua news agency reported that he stood in a "scenic spot" and that the temperature dropped to -29C.

Jin broke his previous record of three hours and 46 minutes, which he set in 2000
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Stavropol, Russia (BBC):

A Russian man had to be rescued after his penis stuck to a frozen bus shelter while he was urinating.

The young man was on his way home from a bar in the southern city of Stavropol, in temperatures of -30C.

He stopped to urinate, leaning against the bus shelter for support, but swayed at a crucial moment and his penis stuck to the frozen metal.

The BBC reports the man was apparently taken by surprise by the cold temperatures, as Stavropol is normally one of the warmest Russian regions.

A large crowd gathered, shouting advice. Finally passerby Valery Levchenko was able to free the man using a kettle of warm water borrowed from a chemist.

The man reportedly refused further medical help before running off.
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Sheffield, England (Ananova):

A goalkeeper played on for ten minutes unaware that his match had been abandoned because of thick fog.

Richard Siddall, who couldn't see beyond his penalty box, assumed all of the action was at the other end.

He only realised when a fan told him the match between his side Stocksbridge Steels, near Sheffield, and Witton Albion had been called off after 30 minutes.

Richard told the Daily Star: "I didn't have a clue. I just stood there waiting for a player to come through the mist."

His manager Wayne Biggins, a former Sheffield Wednesday player, said: "We were in the dressing rooms but Richard thought we were still playing.

"No-one had a clue where he was until it dawned on us that he must have still been on the pitch."
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Chow
SuperChef
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