Calling all foodies, cooks and would-be cooks: whatever your skill level in the kitchen, become a master just in time for the holidays at the Taste of Home Cooking School show, presented live at Prior Lake High School in Savage on Saturday, Nov. 6.

Taste of Home has been hosting cooking schools since the 1950s. This event is the first time the national company has presented the cooking school in the Twin Cities area. It is sponsored by Southwest Newspapers and Prior Lake-Savage Area Schools Community Education.

By Forrest Adams

Last summer zebra mussels were discovered in Prior Lake, and this summer in Lake Minnetonka, sandwiching the communities of Chanhassen, Eden Prairie, Victoria, Chaska and Shakopee.

Could the non-native aquatic species be coming soon to a lake near you? The answer depends a lot on how much vigilance is practiced by boaters and anglers who transport boats, bait, and water between lakes and other bodies of water.

Jeans Day for Charity, promoted as “an ongoing, fun method for raising funds for nonprofits while boosting employee morale,” is being planned for the Greater Southwest Metro Area of the Twin Cities.

Jeans Day is spearheaded by Southwest Newspapers, a multimedia company that serves the Twin Cities southwest suburbs with seven community weekly newspapers (including the Chaska Herald), three shoppers, a large number of informational websites and a growing array of specialty and niche publications.

By Chuck Friedbauer

Chaska High School academic team coach Jenny Stone knows a good thing when she sees it.

“Even though he’s no longer the official coach, you just don’t turn off the passion Chris Lenius has for leading our program and teaching our kids,” she said.

By Chuck Friedbauer

The District 112 school board has voted to refinance some of its current bonds, with a potential savings of $200,000 for local taxpayers.

The Series 2004A bonds were used to pay for, among other items, the construction of Victoria Elementary School, the construction and equipment of the fourth house at Chaska High School and the purchase of the site which became Chanhassen High School.

By Richard Crawford

Three men have been arrested in conjunction with home burglaries in Carver County and as many as 10 other counties around the state and Wisconsin, according to the Carver County Sheriff’s Office.

On July 12, seven residences in rural Carver County were ransacked and burglarized during the day by the trio of suspects, who have been charged in Anoka County and are expected to be charged in other jurisdictions.

On Aug. 20 Tyler James Funk, 24, was sentenced to six years and three months in prison for committing armed robberies of convenience stores in Chanhassen and Waconia in summer 2009, according to a Carver County press release.

On July 30, 2009, a clerk called 911 after Funk displayed a handgun in a threatening manner and demanded cash and cigarettes at the Holiday gas station in Chanhassen.

Ricardo Lozano, 29, of Chaska, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for violating his probation and failing to register as a predatory offender. 

On March 31, 2005, a Carver County jury convicted Lozano of first-degree criminal sexual conduct, kidnapping, terroristic threats and fifth-degree Assault, according to a Carver County Attorney’s Office press release.

The Carver County Attorney’s Office argued that Lozano should go to prison for 12 years – a sentence in accordance with the Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines, the release stated.

The Minnesota Landscape Arboretum AppleHouse opened Sept. 1.

Located 1.5 miles west of the Arboretum entrance on Highway 5, at the intersection with Rolling Acres Road, the AppleHouse offers a changing inventory of apples, including many University of Minnesota introductions, including Honeycrisps.

By Mark W. Olson

A group of city, local and state officials, as well as one protester, attended the Tuesday morning dedication of a Chaska historical marker.

The 1938 roadside marker, along County Road 61 west of downtown Chaska, had fallen into disrepair, with missing stone, overgrown weeds, and a vandalized bronze plaque. Last year the marker underwent a $170,000 restoration, paid for by the state.