Sauce

Item: Classico It's Pasta Anytime What you get: 1 meal Cost: About $2.80 Nutritional content: Penne -- 540 calories, 8 grams fat, 1 gram saturated fat, 850 milligrams sodium; Spaghetti -- 550 calories, 8 grams fat, 1 gram saturated fat, 890 milligrams sodium Preparation time: 2 to 3 minutes in microwave Review: I love this product. It's not haute cuisine. And it's not sauce just like Mama used to make. But it's pasta with decent sauce in three minutes -- without any sauteing, simmering or even boiling.

Overcooking is what kills asparagus for most people. Memories of gray, limp and pungent spears follow wary eaters like ghosts from a nightmare. But when treated right, asparagus is a versatile and complex vegetable. Its flavor profile can switch from green and grassy to sweet and nutty just depending on how it's cooked. That's why so many chefs love to put this "grande dame of spring" on their menus. Ben Simpkins, the executive chef at Richardson Farms in White Marsh, makes an asparagus "cappuccino," in which a cup half-filled with hot asparagus soup is topped with cold asparagus foam made by shooting the cold soup through a whipped-cream gun. "I love asparagus, and this is my favorite dish," says Simpkins.

Add fiesta flavor to your next salad. Buy greens from the local salad bar to save even more time.This recipe is from Pace Picante Sauces.Fast Fiesta Ensalada6 cups packed, assorted torn salad greens1 1/2 cups cherry tomato halves1 medium red bell pepper, cut into 1x 1/4 -inch strips1/2 cup frozen, fresh or canned whole kernel corn, thawed and drained if necessary1 2 1/4 -ounce can sliced ripe olives, drained1/3 cup sliced green onions with tops1/3 cup...

The only thing more shocking than Italian pasta from a microwave is how great it can be. At Daniela's Pasta and Pastries, a tiny, two-table Hampden restaurant, entrees are kept in a glass deli case, and re-heated to order in one of the microwave ovens. What good, you may ask, can come from a nuke job? If the Lasagna alla Bolognese ($6.99) is any indication, this method works quite well. Daniela's lasagna is handmade-on-site, with a rich red meat sauce rendered pink by a bechamel that totes a wisp of nutmeg.

Item: Eckrich KC Masterpiece Authentic Barbecue What you get: 1 1/4 pounds Cost: About $6 Preparation time: Heat and serve Review: When my Aunt Pat makes barbecue pork, the aroma alone makes your mouth water. But she lives in Chicago and is very health-conscious now, so it's rare that her barbecue crosses my lips. Luckily, the people at Eckrich have come to my rescue. Their KC Masterpiece barbecues are first-rate. We tried the Shredded Pork, and everyone came back for seconds. The sauce is thick and rich - not too sweet, but not too tangy.

Item: Create a Meal! Oven Roasted chicken flavorsWhat you get: 4 servingsCost: About $3Preparation time: 20 to 25 minutesReview: Barbecue Chicken and Chicken and Stuffing are among the latest additions to Green Giant's Create a Meal! line of meal starters. While nobody would mistake these casseroles as made from scratch, the frozen bags of vegetables and sauce (you add 1 pound of uncooked chicken strips) are convenient. The Barbecue flavor offers chicken, potatoes, lots of carrots, green beans and corn in a mild sauce.

Some days, your work is not excellent. Some days it is just so-so. Recently, for instance, I made a barbecue sauce that was the Roman Hruska of sauces, reminding me of the late Senator from Nebraska who spoke up for mediocrity. It was supposed to have been a zippy topping slathered on top of pork tenderloin. The tenderloin, fixed in my kettle cooker, turned out fine. The sauce, made with honey, chili peppers, orange juice and orange zest, turned out to be more fruity than fiery. These days, pork tenderloins are amazingly lean, sometimes sporting less fat than a fashion model.

SOMETIMES A good sauce can save supper. Or so I am told. Even though this never happens to me, let's pretend something was cooked much too long. Let's say the something was a fillet of fish and that instead of closely monitoring its progress as it sat on the barbecue grill, you instead played catch with your kid in the alley. Continuing this make-believe scenario, let's say that when you returned to the grill you began grilling a mango instead of removing the fish from the fire. That's right, a mango.

Vodka pasta sauce is hardly a novelty item in 2006, judging from the menus of many Italian restaurants and the fact that we had no trouble finding so many jars of it in supermarkets. But it is hardly a classic sauce, according to the Web site, foodtimeline.org. According to the attributions collected on this amusing and informative food site, vodka sauce showed up at the height of nouvelle cuisine - or, more accurately, nuova cucina in 1980s Italy. Vodka is not as dominant an ingredient as cream and cheese in this rich sauce, and our six tasters had trouble detecting its presence in most of the brands.

What's sauce for the goose . . . may be a mystery to the cook.Who, me? Prepare a sauce? Are you kidding?But there is something about sauce on a dish -- be it a simple white sauce for a seafood gratin or a rich, classic, brown Madeira sauce for meat or a chocolate ganache for dessert -- that says, "This is special." Sauces can make family meals memorable or give a touch of luxe to home entertaining.Yeah, but those things take a lot of "special" preparation, too, don't they?Sauces are perfect for the way folks cook today.

The Downtown Partnership is bringing back the Rockfish Celebration, Feb 16-26. Twelve restaurants are participating in the 11-day promotion. You're just going to have to double up one day. Here's who's doing what in this year's Rockfish Celebration . B&O Brasserie - Rockfish with frog leg jambalaya, braised greens and gumbo sauce The Brewer's Art - Daily rockfish entrees Charleston - Chef Cindy Wolf...

Whatever Punxsutawny Phil predicts today, we can rest assured that there's more cold weather ahead. And, as we all know, cold weather calls for comfort food. Actually, any excuse for comfort food will do, but setting out to prepare tummy-warming fuel for body and soul is particularly satisfying this time of year. Without getting into what defines comfort food for each person, some kind of pasta, aka noodles, makes the Top 10 list for virtually everyone on the planet - or at least this half of it. And since we welcome the opportunity to heat up the kitchen, some kind of baked pasta dish seems to smack of nirvana.

This week's dining review in Live is of Midtown BBQ & Brew, the successor to Midtown Yacht Club. Erik Maza has the review here . Former owner Nathan Beveridge is back, and Anthony Harrison is in as managing parnter and chef. Harrison is a big barbecue guy and his barbecue is big. "The portions at Midtown are big," Erik says. "Even the half-rack of ribs is intimidating, and leaves plenty of leftovers. " About those ribs, they're not baby-back ribs. They're beef ribs, so no they may not fall of the bone, as the Constitution requires, but they have good, strong flavor that doesn't come from added-on sauce.

It's the Ravens' first home playoff game since 2007, and depending on the outcome of the Denver-New England game, it could be their last home game until next season. So let's make this tailgate count. Since the weather this weekend is predicted to be in the 30s, you'll want something to chase off the chill. That's where the meatball sub comes in. It's easy to make at home and assemble in the parking lot — or at home, if that's where you'll be watching. Meatball subs Makes 10 six-inch subs Prep and cooking time: 11/2 hours Meatball ingredients: Makes 20 2-ounce meatballs 1 ounce extra virgin olive oil 1/2 medium yellow onion, minced 5 cloves of garlic 1 pound ground beef 1 pound mild Italian sausage (casing removed)

We're dealing with good and bad news this week. First, the upside: some decent-sized acts come to town this week. The bad: they're practically all jam-packed into the coming weekend. In other words, choose wisely. On Monday, you don't have many options, but feel free to check out 98 Rock's Noise in the Basement at Baltimore Soundstage. For $5, you can see local bands (this week's include Anoxia, Never Thought and more), drop off your own demo and get an open bar for the first 98 minutes.

With the Tortellini Boscaiola ($10), Pazani (a combination of the words pasta, pizza and panini) delivers a rich cream sauce that's remarkably pumpkin orange for a rose. This is a tenaciously clingy sauce. You could complain that the sauce isn't as silky as you might expect in a rose cream, but that's nitpicking. Any pasta style would work with this Boscaiola, but stick with the cheese-stuffed tri-color tortellini — Pazani presents it al dente. Boscaiola recipes can call for sausage or bacon.

Mary Ellen Psaltis of Olympia, Wash., requested an Eggplant Parmesan recipe that, she wrote, "was printed in the Esquire magazine some 20 years ago. It was a World's Best Recipe by Walter Mondale and apparently the sauce was superb." Kathleen S. Kosinski of North East responded. "I don't have Mondale's but I do have Frank Sinatra's and, I must say, it is delicious. Given on daytime TV by his wife, Barbara." Eggplant Parmesan Serves 6 SAUCE: 2 tablespoons vegetable oil 1 clove garlic 1/4 teaspoon oregano 1/3 cup tomato paste 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon black pepper one 14 1/2 -ounce can peeled tomatoes 1/4 cup parsley flakes 1 bay leaf EGGPLANT: 1 large globe eggplant, sliced 1 large egg 1/4 cup flour 1/2 teaspoon salt 6 to 8 tablespoons olive oil nonstick spray 6 ounces grated mozzarella To make the sauce, mix sauce ingredients and simmer 30 to 45 minutes.

Thick, creamy pasta sauces don't have to be laden with calories, and they don't have to take forever to make. Sometimes it is just a matter of stirring in the right ingredient. In this case, ricotta cheese. To borrow a tip from chef and cookbook author Mario Batali, hot pasta water is blended with the ricotta to "melt" it into a creamier texture. For this recipe, we broiled cherry tomatoes to get optimal flavor, and used their juice to help create the sauce when we mixed in the cheese.

Former Baltimorean Steve Raichlen — author of "The Barbecue Bible," "How To Grill" and "Planet Barbeque!" — recently added to his impressive cookbook collection with the release of an eBook titled "Raichlen's Tailgating: 31 Righteous Recipes for On-the-Go Grilling. " Raichlen, who has firmly established himself as master of all things barbecue, has now turned his attention to the distinctly American institution of tailgating. As Raichlen observes in his introduction, "Tailgating would appear to be little more than a big, rambunctious party in a parking lot. But scratch beneath the surface of the beer- and brat-fueled conviviality and you'll discover a raw desire to win. Yes, tailgating itself has become a competition sport.

Mission BBQ celebrates America, from its heroes — firefighters, soldiers, police — to its food — barbecue. With a familiar restaurant concept, a handsome interior design and a short menu, Mission BBQ is a welcome change of pace in chain restaurant-heavy Glen Burnie. While not bad, the barbecue could be better. Still, it's a concept you could see expanding to other counties, and eventually, states. Mission BBQ feels familiar in a fast casual way. It's set up like a Chipotle or Qdoba — you order at a cash register and wait for your food at a pick-up station.