Author: NY TIMES

After months of brainstorming how to have the most delicious wedding cake possible, Rachel Karten and Roxanne Rosensteel, a pastry chef based in Santa Barbara, Calif., concluded that only one kind of wedding cake could fit the bill: a big sheet cake. The original plan was to have four of them, but when Ms. Karten, the former head of social media at Bon Appétit, saw the 3-foot-long cake at the designer Sandy Liang’s wedding in June, she asked Ms. Rosensteel if it might be possible to combine four sheet cakes into one.It was. Ms. Rosensteel baked an olive oil chiffon…

A Boeing 737 Max 9 operated by Alaska Airlines made an emergency landing at Portland International Airport in Oregon on Friday evening after experiencing a midair pressure problem that passengers said blew out a chunk of the fuselage.The airline said that Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 had made a safe emergency landing carrying 171 passengers and six crew members at the Portland airport shortly after takeoff for Ontario, Calif. Within hours, the company said that it was grounding its fleet of 65 Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft until it could inspect each plane. It said in a statement that it expected…

The Justice Department is in the late stages of an investigation into Apple and could file a sweeping antitrust case taking aim at the company’s strategies to protect the dominance of the iPhone as soon as the first half of this year, said three people with knowledge of the matter.The agency is focused on how Apple has used its control over its hardware and software to make it more difficult for consumers to ditch the company’s devices, as well as for rivals to compete, said the people, who spoke anonymously because the investigation was active.Specifically, investigators have examined how the…

The Food and Drug Administration has allowed Florida to import millions of dollars worth of medications from Canada at far lower prices than in the United States, overriding fierce decades-long objections from the pharmaceutical industry.The approval, issued in a letter to Florida Friday, is a major policy shift for the United States, and supporters hope it will be a significant step forward in the long and largely unsuccessful effort to rein in drug prices. Individuals in the United States are allowed to buy directly from Canadian pharmacies, but states have long wanted to be able to purchase medicines in bulk…

In 1977, the year after releasing his debut album, he shot to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with the lachrymose ballad “Don’t Give Up on Us.” Many years later, Owen Wilson, as Hutch, parodied the song in none-too-loving fashion in a 2004 feature-film comedy version of the show, which also starred Ben Stiller as Starsky and Snoop Dogg as Huggy Bear.Mr. Soul, who often said that music was his priority over acting, released five albums in his career and notched four Top 10 hits in Britain in the 1970s, including “Don’t Give Up on Us,” which climbed to…

For years Iran justified its military presence in Iraq and Syria, to its own people and the world, as a strategy for keeping terrorist groups at bay. Iranian officials frequently boasted that fighting terrorists directly or through proxy militias in the region meant they didn’t have to fight them at home.That sense of security was shattered on Wednesday, with the deadliest terrorist attack since the 1979 founding of the Islamic Republic — two suicide explosions in the city of Kerman that killed 88 people, including 30 children, and injured more than 200. The Islamic State, a mortal enemy of Iran,…

As Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken returned to the Middle East on Friday in an effort to ease escalating tensions, Israel’s defense minister floated a postwar plan for the Gaza Strip that exposed divisions in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s wartime government.The proposal by the defense minister, Yoav Gallant, who is a moderate member of Mr. Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party, was widely seen as a trial balloon, but it showed the pressure Israel was facing as Washington and others press for a shift to a less intense phase of the war.Further complicating diplomatic efforts in the region, Hassan Nasrallah, the…

Wayne Rooney was shocked when he was told after just 15 games that his tenure as Birmingham City manager was coming to an end.The former England forward has given the impression that he has joined a long-term project after signing a three-and-a-half-year deal. Rooney has enjoyed open dialogue with the club’s top brass – including chief executive Gary Cook and director of football Craig Gardner – and there is no sign their confidence in him is waning.Birmingham have won just two of Rooney’s 15 games in charge, but even after New Year’s Day defeat to Leeds United he remained optimistic…

Although they attended the same high school in Rochester Hills, Mich., Julia Marie Gerard and Adam Edward Romund never crossed paths until their senior year. They were placed in the same personal finance class and became fast friends. The two began spending more time together outside of class, attempting to prepare for their A.P. calculus exam.“What was supposed to be studying at the library was not studying at all,” Mr. Romund, 23, said. “It was basically a date. We did zero studying and just talked about random stuff.”Their mutual crushes prompted Mr. Romund to ask Ms. Gerard to the prom…

Attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea by the Houthi rebels in Yemen have left oil tanker operators facing an unwelcome calculation: accept the risks of steaming through the danger zone, or lose business.The risks of conflict in the area may even be increasing, with a coalition of 12 nations led by the United States warning Wednesday that it would “hold malign actors accountable for unlawful seizures and attacks.”Despite the attacks and the risk of more, some oil companies insist that the ships they charter take this route rather than an excursion around Africa, which could require an extra…