Taco Bell

Item: Taco Bell Pour 'N Simmer Taco Seasoning What you get: Seasoning for 2 pounds of meat or 14 servings Cost: About $2 Nutritional content: Garden: 20 calories, 0 grams fat, 0 grams saturated fat, 400 milligrams sodium Preparation time: Three minutes added to already cooked meat Review: When I make tacos, I usually toss in half a jar of salsa after I add the taco seasoning. With Taco Bell's new Pour 'N Simmer sauce, I can have both salsa and seasoning in one step. The Garden sauce we tried includes onions, tomatoes and red and green peppers as well as traditional taco seasonings.

McALLEN, Texas - At the Texas-Mexico border, where American and Mexican cultures have grown so close that there's no particular difference between the two, a common dialect has spawned that's neither standard Spanish nor standard English. It's called Tex-Mex - a scramble of Spanish, English and Spanglish slang. It's spoken everywhere, from bars to boardrooms to the evening TV news. "Camioneta," or truck, becomes "troca." "Cuidado" - that is, "watch out" - becomes "watchale." You need to know a smattering of both English and Spanish to understand the phrase, "Watchale, here comes la troca," which is standard Tex-Mex.

Ah, the World Series. The crack of the bat, the roar of the crowd, the endless commercials, the nonstop promos for one dopey sitcom after another, the four-hour games how can you not love it?Some observations from a lifelong baseball fan as the Fall Classic -- or is it the Taco Bell Fall Classic now? -- between the Yankees and Braves gets under way:It's a tad brisk to be playing "the Summer Game" now, isn't it?Baseball sold its soul to the devil Television a long time ago. But apparently no one told the network executives that when they schedule night games, in northern climes, in late October, it can often get, oh, what's the word we're looking for here?

Three Hampstead men were arrested Sunday on assault charges and accused of attacking an off-duty Sykesville police officer and his friends at a fast-food restaurant in Westminster, police said.In charging documents, Westminster police said they responded to a report of a fight at Taco Bell in the 600 block of Baltimore Blvd. about 1: 38 a.m.Capt. Dean Brewer, a police spokesman, said the incident apparently began earlier at Tully's, a restaurant and bar in Cranberry Mall, where a man bumped a woman in a group with Sykesville Officer Shawn D. Kilgore.

The Force will soon be arriving at a toy store and Taco Bell near you. In May, the merchandising and food promotion blitz for the long-awaited new "Star Wars" movie, "Episode I -- The Phantom Menace," is scheduled to open. A battalion of toy action figures and space crafts related to the movie will go on sale three weeks before "Phantom" opens nationwide. Lucasfilm Ltd., which is producing the movie, has licensed Hasbro Inc., Galoob Toys Inc. and Lego Group to make the toys.

A woman who robbed the Eldersburg Taco Bell in the 1400 block of Liberty Road on Monday may be the same woman who robbed the restaurant this summer, state police say.The robber is described as white and about 40 to 45. She has straight, dark-blond hair and a dark complexion, which appeared to be lined or wrinkled. She wore a red-and-white-plaid flannel shirt, or jacket.Police said the woman drove to a drive-through window at 6: 55 p.m. in a dark blue or black four-door vehicle, possibly a Toyota Corolla.

As Dinky the Chihuahua is running to the border for Taco Bell, people are running to breeders and pet stores for a Chihuahua of their own. But Chihuahua lovers worry that these dinky dogs will wind up in shelters.Remember when "101 Dalmatians" unleashed a dalmatians craze? And months later, one adorable dalmatian after another was spotted at animal shelters? Though darling, dalmatians can be temperamental dogs to own - and their trips to the pound tipped off shelter workers to the possible fate of Chihuahuas.

"Pardon our Progress" declares a banner at Long Reach Village Center in Columbia, politely reminding visitors that renovation work begun in early fall is still under way.But there's an end in sight -- July, officials say -- and a sense of optimism about the project."This will breathe new life into our community," said Cecilia Januszkiewicz, who represents Long Reach on the Columbia Council.The Safeway will double in size, and the refurbished center will include a 5,700-square-foot Blockbuster video store and a hair and nail salon.

A man in a ski mask hit an Edgewater Taco Bell employee while the youth was outside the restaurant emptying a trash can Thursday, county police said.Brian Gunn, 18, of Edgewater told police he was emptying garbage in the parking lot of the Taco Bell in the 3000 block of Solomons Island Road about 11: 30 p.m. when a man approached him from behind.Gunn turned and asked the man what he wanted, and the man hit Gunn on his left wrist with a wooden stick four times, police said.Gunn threw a trash can at the man and ran back into the restaurant.

NEW YORK -- In a move that had been anticipated, PepsiCo Inc. said yesterday that it will spin off its restaurants and possibly sell its restaurant supply company to focus on its more profitable and promising soft drinks and snacks.Pepsi will shed its biggest line of business -- KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut -- which it has assembled over two decades, because it has dragged down earnings and chewed through much-needed capital. It didn't give the terms of the spinoff, though it expects to complete it by year-end.