Category: News

Shortly after her father-in-law left office in disgrace, Lara Trump — spouse of his younger son Eric — was hailed by some Republicans as the future of the party. Unlike other family members, who are loose cannons (Don Jr.), tainted (Ivanka), not much liked (her husband) or disinterested (Tiffani), she seemed like a respectable choice. But she’s far from ideal, and a recent report that she’s allegedly funneling money from dog rescue charities into her father-in-law’s businesses should make matters worse.

According to The Huffington Post, numerous documents show that Big Dog Ranch Rescue, a charity linked with Lara Trump, has spent $1.9 million at the former president’s properties, including a whopping $225,000 at Mar-A-Lago, once treated like the “Southern White House,” this weekend.

As per HuffPo:

Internal Revenue Service filings show that the group has spent as much as $1,883,160 on fundraising costs at Mar-a-Lago and Trump’s golf course 18 miles north in Jupiter starting in 2014. Lara Trump, the wife of Eric Trump, started being listed as a chairwoman for charity events in 2018, and the group’s president, Lauren Simmons, visited the White House in 2019 for the signing of a bill addressing animal cruelty.

In a response, Simmons defended associating herself with the Trumps. She was also, perhaps not coincidentally, among those spreading misinformation about the fraud in the 2020 election.

When people caught wind that a dog charity linked to Lara Trump was spending so much money at her father-in-law’s properties, social media was quick to condemn her. Some compared her to another canine-related scam artist, 101 Dalmatians baddie Cruella De Vil.

Others were simply horrified.

And some pointed out that maybe, just maybe, the Trump family is not as wealthy as they say they are.

(Via HuffPo)

Soleil Moon Frye has lived a life on camera, becoming a household name as a kid actor while starring as the precocious Punky Brewster in the ’80s sitcom of the same name. When the show ended, however, she was left to navigate life as a teenager with the added pressure of still being a fascination to the press and public. She grew up and spoke out — about teen drug use and her decision to have breast reduction surgery. All on camera. She tried to find herself, leaving Hollywood for college in New York to study filmmaking, camera in hand. Not to paraphrase Alanis, but she loved, she lost, she learned. You know, life. And she documented a whole lot of it in a way that might feel more common now, but which was uncommon for someone who grew up in the less technologically lush ’90s.

For years, Frye kept her videotapes, audio recordings, and journals in a box. But something changed four years ago while she was planning a documentary and exploring how reliable a narrator our memories can be. The end result is Kid90 (which is now streaming on Hulu), a far more raw and personal project than Frye intended, but also a fascinating slice of ’90s nostalgia filled with raw footage of her and a whole lot of familiar faces that were in her orbit as a fun-loving teen in ’90s Hollywood. Fun is the key word here and the thing that you walk away feeling most nostalgic for. No matter when you grew up and who you hung out with, you can almost surely relate to the easy laughs and worry-free moments of your own awkward teen years. But it’s Frye’s reflection of those good times and also the more challenging times that gives the doc its soul.

While many of us (myself included) often try to avoid lingering on our past trauma lest it catch up to us and weigh us down, Frye is willing to sift through hers with the idea that she can, as she says, turn her pain into art. This while trying to better understand her memories and a life formed by her experiences. We spoke with Frye about that journey, about letting go of guilt, how the sexualization of teens then and now crosses the generational divide, and about finding her way back home.

What was the prompt for this exploration?

I had originally started it as a documentary that was meant to be about anything but me. It was not originally going to be a personal coming-of-age story. I was fascinated by the idea of memory and if things happen the way I remembered them. And I also think on a subconscious level, I had put so many of the tapes away. And as much as I had lived this very joyful, fun, amazing life, there was also pain that was under the surface of some of my experiences. And so, about four years ago, I wanted to know if things happened the way I remembered them because I remembered so much of it being so joyful. And then I went on this journey of exploration that really changed my life forever.

It takes a lot of courage to look back. I know, me personally, I am very much of the keep it in a box, move forward mindset. I’m guessing it took some time to get to a place you’d be comfortable calling some of those memories into question, right?

Yeah. I mean, for me, I wasn’t planning, again, on it being this personal experience, so I literally had locked it all away. And then in the process of opening it up, I discovered so much that was there that I wasn’t planning on finding or discovering. And once you unlock those experiences, you can’t put them back, nor would I want to, because they were part of my transformation, of me rediscovering who I once was. It was almost like I left a chronological blueprint for me to find my way back home.

Obviously, you’ve talked about your life in the past with other projects, other documentaries, books, and talk show appearances through the years. I’m curious, the level of catharsis that you feel from that, does it ever match what you’re hoping for, or is it a mixed bag?

I mean, for me, it was incredibly cathartic, it was incredibly painful, and it was also incredibly beautiful. And the way that I look at it is that, my parents had always raised us to be fighters, to be survivors, that when you have a painful experience, you turn it into art. And I really look at it as everything having happened for me and not to me. So it was a culmination of all of it — the messiness, the joy, the love, all of it — that’s brought me to right here right now, and I wouldn’t change a thing.

And at this point, is it [telling your story] more of a rewarding feeling than in the past?

It’s been such a rewarding experience, because it’s stripped me down to my truth. It’s been this process of peeling back the onion, and peeling it back to my core essence, where this was not about it being about doing it for anyone else. You know what I mean? There’s so much teen approval that I think you hear me seeking as a little girl in it, when I’m going, “Am I my pretty? Am I ugly? Am I this? Am I that?” And the little girl inside that wanted approval from everyone else, which I think is so what the human experience is, of so many teenagers and so many adults, right? Who doesn’t want to be loved?

In the course of this experience, I realized not only did I love people, but as I say, I didn’t realize how loved back I was. And so, the illumination of that has been so deeply profound, and also to try to piece it together and just show the blueprint of what was there, and to get to a place, where I could just speak my truth and not be dependent on anyone else’s validation of that, do you know what I mean? That was an incredibly rewarding feeling, because it came with a great deal of pain and reflection, and yet a great deal of courage. You know, I keep thinking about what are my feelings as this is about to come out? And my dad always had this word that he would say, which was “anticipatory”, and I really feel anticipatory about it. [Laughs] And at the same time, I feel really proud to have done that shadow work.

You had mentioned in the film at a couple of points, feeling some level of guilt over certain things that had happened. Some of the losses [of friends] and not necessarily hearing people in that time when … and who could expect that from a teenager, to be able to be that present? But I’m curious how you’re dealing with that, processing that, from when the film wrapped to now. Are you still carrying that or have you let yourself off the hook a little?

There was a great deal of guilt that I felt and just wanting to be there more, or wanting to have seen it more. I think about Jonathan Brandis and just how much I loved him. And I love his parents so much, and we talk on a regular basis, and they love him so much. And sometimes no matter how much love is around us, still, we can’t always take away someone’s pain.

And so, I have really processed, and I’m still in the process of processing, but I really do feel like it has been a really cathartic experience. And now I look at, okay, how do I continue to live my life, where I can listen a little more, hear a little more, and try to be more compassionate and make… I love that the teenage girl in me writes that letter and says, “Have you made your life worthy? Who are you today?” And asks all of those questions, that I feel that I now want to live with a deeper purpose.

What’s the interaction with this footage and the story of the documentary with your kids? Have they seen it?

I’ve shown the girls, which has been amazing, and they’ve really been my supporter. As parents, you’re like, “No, I’ve been through it.” And they’re like, “No, you haven’t…” And it’s like, “no, I really have, I’m going to show you.” And so, it has created a really beautiful conversation for my daughters and me. And also, they were such a part of it. They did research. One of my daughters shot it. I mean, they have really been a part of the process. And I think that’s really important, especially when you’re living in the edit bay, day and night. And when there were a lot of days that I was away from home, for them to know that what I was working on was something that was so deeply important to my growth. And also, because I changed so much through the process, and it was such a transformation and it was impossible for it not to be because I had never really reflected on any of this. So it brought up so much, and I was going through such a transformation, and they were seeing it. And so, I thought it was important for them to have an understanding of it.

I think it’s really interesting also, because it really obviously directly connects to what people are experiencing right now, as they grow up. They have access to all this technology. They’re on camera constantly. They’re broadcasting their thoughts constantly. Big question, but do you think the generational divide is overstated and that there’s more that connects us?

I mean, I look at the stage of me going through puberty as a really clear indication of something that is so relevant today… and the ways in which the objectification that was happening around me at the time… It’s been fascinating in recent months, even just to hear the plethora of [ways that] this conversation, which I think is so important to have… I was a little girl, right? And then I started developing, and it’s as if sometimes they want to keep you in that box of being a little girl. And yet, we grow up, and we go through puberty and we go through these awkward stages.

And the way in which I envision it now for teens, being magnified so much by social media… I think it is more important now than ever that we have these conversations. That we talk about it through documentaries, that we in the media have these dialogues, and that we have these dialogues at home. Because really, more than ever, I feel that it is so important to the mental health and wellbeing of young people that we have these dialogues. It’s a really important conversation to have, and it’s our responsibility to have it. So as far as the divide, I think so many similarities still exist and are just completely magnified on a whole other level.

I agree. It’s interesting because it’s almost like this project is an unintentional bookend to the Britney Spears documentary. I don’t know if you’ve seen that, but there are some similarities specifically with that topic and not just the way that women are objectified, but also…

The sexualization?

The sexualization, but also the malice that the media comes at people with, referring specifically to the Britney Spears thing with Justin Timberlake and how much she was made to be a villain and what that does. Have you seen that documentary?

I haven’t seen it yet, but I’m familiar with it. And my daughters have seen it, and we had conversations around it. I’m grateful that documentarians are telling these stories and that journalists are shedding light on these stories. And I think it’s really important, and it’s definitely on the top of my list of documentaries that I want to watch.

Does this experience solidify the want to continue down this road as a documentary filmmaker? Are you working on any other projects?

I love documentaries, and it’s interesting, because the [previous] documentary that I made [Sonny Boy], I also locked away in a vault for many, many years. And so, now I plan on adding some pieces to it and finally sharing it with the world. My father had gone through Alzheimer’s, and I drove cross country with him and retraced his history. And I realize now that I wasn’t ready to share it with the world. So I tend to work on these projects that span over multiple decades, which I love. So I want to continue making documentaries. And then I am so grateful for the fact that I get to also be doing what I love with acting and this incredible experience with Punky Brewster. And being able to do the continuation has just been a dream come true. And so, I really feel like I am living a dream in that way. And then the amazing work I get to do with CORE, which is a non-profit so close to my heart, where we’ve done over half a million vaccinations and testing of over 4.8 million people across the country and nationwide. I mean, it’s awe-inspiring. So to continue being of service to others is really important to me too.

‘Kid90’ is streaming now on Hulu. ‘Punky Brewster’ is streaming on Peacock.

This Sunday, March 14th (3.14), is Pi Day — the only federally recognized annual celebration for math nerds, pizza heads, and pie fans. In fact, 3/14 has been recognized as an official annual celebration since 1988 after San Francisco physicist Larry Shaw made it a thing by celebrating the mathematic constant with a fruit pie party in San Francisco’s Exploratorium.

That’s right, in the ’80s you could throw a fruit pie party with a bunch of nerds and get it turned into a legitimate annual celebration. It was indeed a different time.

To celebrate Pi Day — which is no longer just for math people after being gradually subsumed by people who just want cheap food — we’re sharing the national food chains with deals of some kind. We also included a few multi-state regional chains. Be sure to hit up your local pizza and pie spots for discounts, as they are probably getting in on the celebration too!

Let’s dive into the best Pi Day deals to get you fed on the cheap.

7-Eleven — Participating 7-Elevens will be selling their large pizzas for just $3.14 in honor of Pi Day all day Sunday. The deal is available via 7-Eleven’s app.

Baker’s Square — Midwest restaurant chain Baker’s Square is taking $2 off whole pies all through Pi Day.

BJ’s Restaurant & Brewhouse — BJ’s will be offering half-off on all large pizzas for take out and delivery when using the promo code “HALFOFF.” BJs has over 15 different pizza options, so get as snobby as you want, whether you dig Deep Dish or want something a little more rustic like BJ’s Tavern-Cut.

Blaze Pizza — Download the Blaze Pizza app before Sunday to receive an 11-inch pizza for just $3.14 on your next visit. Which could be on Pi Day if you plan it right, but will otherwise be valid until April 12th.

Boston Market — Download the Boston Market app to receive a free chicken pot pie when you order any potpie and drink combo on Pi Day.

The Fresh Market — East coast-based Fresh Market will be offering $3.14 off all chicken pot pies and 9-inch cherry and apple pies throughout Pi Day only.

Hungry Howie’s — Starting this Saturday until next Tuesday, Hungry Howie’s will be offering medium one-topping pizzas for just $3.14.

Marie Callender’s — If you’re in the mood for a variety of savory pies, look no further than Marie Callender’s this Pi Day — where you can pick up four mini pot pies for just $39.95 when you ask for the Family Feast special. All mini pies are served with salad and cornbread.

If that’s way too much pie, you can also opt for a free slice of dessert pie when you purchase a full-priced entree on Pi Day.

Marco’s Pizza — Using the code PIDAY, buy one large pizza at full price and receive another for just $3.14. This deal is only valid on Pi Day.

Mountain Mike’s Pizza — California, Oregon, and Utah-based Mountain Mike’s is offering customers $3.14 off any large pizza order on Pi Day when using the promo code PIZZA314.

Papa John’s — This isn’t exactly a Pi Day special, but Papa John’s is selling their new large Epic Stuffed Crust pizza for $12 — which we thought was worth a mention for all your cheese heads out there. Would’ve been cool if it was $3.14, but it’s not.

Pieology — Purchase any Artisan Thin Pizza for full price on PI day and get the chance to pick up a second for just $3.14.

Round Table Pizza — Using the code 314PI receive $3.14 off any medium, large, or extra-large pizza order. This deal is valid from the weekend until Tuesday of next week.

Your Pie — Download the Your Pie Rewards app to receive $3.14 off any 10-pinch pizza between March 14th and March 16th.

There are dozens and dozens of major movie stars chained to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, contracted to come back whenever they ask them to do whatever — do a quick cameo, fight Thanos, etc. One of the first to ever sign up is Gwyneth Paltrow, supporting scene-stealer in the one that started them all: 2008’s Iron Man. She’s the MCU’s resident Pepper Pots, Tony Stark’s assistant and later wife, a role she’s essayed seven times, sometimes as a quick walk-on. Even she’s confessed she’s not sure which ones she’s in, which makes sense because there are almost two dozen of them.

As you can perhaps surmise, she’s not all that into returning to the franchise. After all, she is a little busy running her own (albeit sometimes questionable) wellness company. So when she was asked, on the People TV show (as caught by EW), what it would take time out of her busy schedule to return as Pepper, her answer was amusingly blunt: She said she’d do it “if it was a small part that I could do in like a day or two.”

In other words, don’t expect Oscar-winning thespian and business owner Gwyneth Paltrow to spend months getting back into that suit she wore in Iron Man Three. Still, maybe you’ll see her again, even if it’s just to, say, get drinks with Kathryn Hahn’s Agatha Harkness in the WandaVision world.

(Via People and EW)

Last week, after two weeks of congressional back-and-forth, President Joe Biden was finally able to sign into law his first major piece of legislation since taking office: the $1.9 trillion pandemic relief plan. It was the most sweeping progressive piece of legislation since the FDR era, at a time of similar economic need. Not only did the bill get approved — with no thanks to Republicans — but the $1400 promised every eligible American would be released quickly, over the weekend…that is, unless your bank is Wells Fargo.

The bank, one of the world’s largest, tweeted out that funds would start hitting accounts not this weekend but on the 17th — on Wednesday, mid-next week. And that’s just when the funds begin being dispersed. It would take longer than that. People were inevitably furious, not the last because the second stimulus payment, the last such package signed into law by former president Donald J. Trump, still hasn’t reached millions of Americans.

So helpless people who thought they were being screwed did what they could: They took to social media, to scream, to steam, and to make gallows humor jokes.

Wells Fargo’s social media team tried to explain their slowness, saying they plan to “process all of the direct deposits according to the effective date provided by the U.S. Treasury.”

But some weren’t buying that, pointing out that even smaller banks did not have similar problems.

For the record, Wells Fargo isn’t the only major bank taking their time with stimulus deployment.

Pasta is one of the most perfect food items to have ever left the kitchen. It’s insanely tasty, incredibly versatile in shape and size, easy to make, deeply comforting, and totally filling. But pasta is really just a noodle — made from a dough of flour, eggs, and (maybe) a touch of water — rolled and cut (or extruded) into shapes to make linguini, macaroni, lasagna, etc.

It’s the sauce that takes pasta to the next level. The sauce that turns noodles into a complete and satisfying meal.

There is a crux to pasta sauce, though. As much as we love coating, drenching, and smothering our penne and orecchiette with sauce, we don’t always have the time to make it from scratch. Sometimes? Sure! Date night? You bet! But there are plenty of times where we all need to forgo the “delicious homemade pasta-with-sauce experience” for something easy.

No shame there at all. Any port in a storm, as they say. That’s where store-bought sauces come in.

More than other grocers, Trader Joe’s seems to understand the need for easy meals. Their freezer aisle is no joke, their pizzas are (mostly) solid, and they keep a consistent, convenient, and cheap lineup of pasta sauces on deck. You can walk into literally any TJ’s and find, at minimum, 14 (!) in-house pasta sauces ready for you to purchase, heat up, and pour over your noods.

As Uproxx’s resident Trader Joe’s aficionado — check my reccos for these wines, These Wines, and THESE WINES — it was only right that I scoured TJ’s shelves for pasta sauce and ranked every single one I could find. From alfredo to Bolognese, these are the best and worst pasta sauces at Trader Joe’s right now, ranked.

14. Organic Marinara Sauce (No Salt Added)

Price: $3

The Sauce:

Obviously, Trader Joe’s was thinking of the health-conscious people monitoring their sodium intake when they created this marinara sauce. There’s still some sodium—about 45 milligrams–which is almost nothing compared to some of the others on this list. But the lack of salt is telling because this red sauce puts the bla in bland.

Healthy as it may be, this marinara is also tasteless. It’s basically just puréed tomatoes. I get it—No Salt Added—but, like, where’s the basil? Where’s the onion? The garlic, oregano, fennel, and parsley that’s so proudly boasted on the ingredients label? None of those organic herbs show up in the taste, and that’s a real bummer because there are so many other foods and products on the market that still manage to maintain low sodium content while actually being flavorful.

There is at least one good note about this marinara, however. The texture is silky and rich, exactly the consistency you’d want in a marinara for your home-made pizza. But the taste, or lack thereof, completely misses the mark.

Bottom Line:

Don’t bother, even if you are on a health kick. By the time you doctor this sauce up to make it actually edible, you could have made the marinara completely from scratch.

13. Organic Marinara Sauce

Price: $3

The Sauce:

Maybe it’s just this specific line of organic marinara sauce that’s bad — because even with salt added this sauce isn’t anything to phone home about.

Now there are some standout qualities. Pop the lid and you’ll be greeted by an aroma reminiscent of a tomato garden full of juicy red fruits on a sunny day. The taste is also undeniably fresh, as if the tomatoes for this sauce were plucked from the vine the very day that you opened up a jar. All the ingredients—similar to the sauce above but with about 500 mg of sodium—are discernable. The consistency is also picture perfect: not too runny, not too thick, and dotted with chunks of tomatoes.

But that’s as far as the compliments go for this red sauce. The flavor profile is paltry. The best thing to compare this one to is the sauce barely coating the dollar-slices at sub-par New York City pizza joints. It fine when you’re 23 and wasted on a Thursday night on the Lower East Side, but it’s never something you truly crave.

Bottom Line:

Not completely terrible, but not all that good either. Skip it.

12. Bolognese Style Tomato & Beef Pasta Sauce

Price: $4

The Sauce:

So this sauce has a bigger, chunkier tomato base than I was expecting. Yes, the minced beef is there and it’s visible, but it’s not nearly the meat-centric sauce I was hoping for. It does have that roasted meat flavor, but even that seems a little sketchy due to the sauce’s off-putting beef-broth aftertaste.

There’s probably a reason why true Bolognese is meant to be slow-cooked. This tastes rushed, and it doesn’t have the savory depth of a homemade sauce. It’s a bit astringent, which likely could have been rectified with a little bit more celery and onion and more time on the stove.

Bottom Line:

You’ll probably enjoy your Bolognese more if you make it yourself.

11. Three Cheese Pomodoro Pasta Sauce

Price: $3

The Sauce:

Made with Romano, parmesan, and asiago cheeses, this sauce smells like tomatoes baked with a layer of cheese hot out the oven. It’s thick and smooth, rich and buttery all at the same time, flushed out with bright notes of ripe tomato and fresh basil.

But that’s about as far as it goes for this sauce. It’s pretty simple in taste and doesn’t quite display the nutty, salty cheesy flavors associated with the blend that makes up the recipe. (It’s also always hard to buy any “cheese blend” product and not imagine that the Parmigianno — the most expensive part of almost any cheese combo — has only been added in trace amounts.)

Bottom Line:

It’s not fair to expect much more from a sauce this cheap. Is it mind-blowing good? No. Is it passable? Yes.

10. Organic Spaghetti Sauce with Mushrooms

Price: $3

The Sauce:

The mushroom aroma is loud on this sauce, but fragrances of basil and Italian spices also permeate the air as it heats up. The consistency is as thick as barbecue sauce and it displays a pretty, brick-red color.

The sauce is chock full of hearty mushroom bits. However, it’s definitely a sweeter-leaning tomato sauce, and the natural citric acidity of the tomatoes has been reduced to “barely noticeable.” The label claims there are only 3 grams of sugar in a jar of this stuff, but it tastes like a lot more.

Bottom Line:

There are people in this world who like sugar in their spaghetti. Those people usually like sugar in their grits too. Those are the folks who would appreciate this Trader Joe’s red sauce. I am not one of those folks.

9. Organic Vodka Sauce

Price: $3

The Sauce:

I am really critical of vodka sauce because it’s one of the pasta sauces (okay who am I kidding, it is the only pasta sauce) that I actually know how to make. But Trader Joe’s version is not a bad option when you’re in a crunch for time.

The sauce is hearty with briny tomatoes, and the texture is rich and smooth. Could it use a bit more cream? For sure. A sprinkle of chili flakes? Yeah, that would give the sauce a nice little kick. But overall, the vodka sauce is silky, bright, and flavorful with a bit of noticeable acid from the tomato.

Bottom Line:

It’s not homemade. But for just three bucks a pop, it’s not not worth it.

8. Limone Alfredo Sauce

Price: $4

The Sauce:

The best way to describe this pasta sauce is tangy.

It’s super pasty—more like a ricotta cheese than an Alfredo sauce made with Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. It smells like the Olive Garden with a hint of lemon, and zest is the most prominent flavor in play. The nutty, buttery cheesiness of the alfredo is there but it’s nearly overshadowed by the pucker of lemon.

This is a pasta sauce that is better suited for an out-of-the-box lasagna or baked ziti, and it’s certainly one that you need to be in the mood for to actually enjoy. When you’re up for it, it certainly delivers a unique, citrusy quality.

Bottom Line:

When you’re tired of the standard pasta sauce iterations, this offers a fun, cheap, easy, and surprisingly tasty option.

7. Traditional Marinara Sauce

Price: $2

The Sauce:

Now here’s a flavorful marinara. This sauce is fresh with tomatoes, bursting with balanced acidity, features distinctive garlic and basil notes, and reveals nice hints of rosemary and pepper. There’s also a nice layer of onion and big onion chunks floating in the sauce.

The biggest complaint against this sauce is the consistency. Although marinaras tend to be on the runnier side, this one is almost watery. You need to reduce it down on the stove. But the flavor profile is solid for a quick pasta or on a pizza.

Bottom Line:

This sauce loses points for its too-loose texture, but what it lacks in consistency it makes up for with flavor.

6. Alfredo Pasta Sauce

Price: $4

The Sauce:

This is a luscious and buttery sauce. While it’s heavier than the Alfredo sauce that coats pasta noodles at restaurants and what you’d probably make at home, it’s not nearly as dense as its Limon Alfredo counterpart.

Every bit of this sauce tastes like what you’d get out of a jar for just $4, but it’s still pretty good. This Alfredo is rich and it exudes the creamy, parmesan flavors typically associated with alfredo sauce. It has a complex decadence and nutty cheesiness that makes this a better option than some other grocery-store Alfredo sauce brands. It could use another turn of fresh black pepper, but overall this sauce is fulfilling and completely satisfying.

Bottom Line:

Are you in the mood for fettuccini but don’t feel like grating parm? This will get the job done.

5. 5. Tomato Basil Marinara

Price: $2

The Sauce:

Now here’s a good pizza sauce if I ever tasted one. Aromatic, sweet, and savory with visible chopped flat basil leaves, the sauce sings a perfectly balanced melody of sweet meets acid. It’s exactly what you want when you’re thinking of marinara, whether it’s to sauce up your pizza or for dunking your mozzarella sticks.

This sauce also has a great consistency. Not too thick, not too runny either. Good for spreading, dipping, and any other way you see fit to eat.

Bottom Line:

Making a Margherita pizza or penne marinara? This is the inexpensive sauce you need.

4. Roasted Garlic Marinara

Price: $2

The Sauce:

Here’s another good Trader Joe’s baseline marinara. It packs a powerful garlicky punch but it’s not too pungent where you’ll be sweating garlic through your pores later. It rounds out with hints of black pepper that only heightens the flavor.

The sauce is as rich and creamy as tomato soup, and it tastes like it should cost a lot more than what it actually does.

Bottom Line:

This sauce is an actual garlic flavor bomb. Use it for everything.

3. Creamy Tomato Basil Pasta Sauce

Price: $3

The Sauce:

So this sauce looks and tastes like vodka sauce more than the actual Trader Joe’s-branded vodka sauce. It has a beautiful orange hue that’s just begging for a sprinkle of grated parm on top. It’s creamy, just as its name suggests, but there are slithery slivers of tomatoes in every bite.

What I like about this sauce is the basil. You can see it. You can taste it. Leaves of it float amid chunks of tomatoes in a nourishing bath of garlicky cream sauce that is buttery smooth.

Bottom Line:

Pick this one up instead of the TJ’s vodka sauce. It’s got more depth and flavor for the same price.

2. Arrabbiata Sauce

Price: $4

The Sauce:

Swirling aromas of garlic, basil, and chili peppers permeate the air from the saucepan and it becomes so very clear that this is going to be some good, quick pasta. Little tomato nuggets floating in the sauce offer a fresh-picked-from-the-garden taste. The sauce features a feathery light hint of spice while maintaining a nice consistency that can coat and fill rigatoni without making it feel too hearty.

This sauce is fully flavorful and delicious—no real doctoring up required.

Bottom Line:

Just a sprinkle more of chili peppers and this could have been an A+ Trader Joe’s Arrabbiata sauce.

1. Spicy Chunky Tomato & Pepper Sauce

Price: $4

The Sauce:

You can smell the pepper on this sauce. Red peppers, green peppers, chili peppers, black pepper. It’s all there in the fragrance, and it all shows up in the taste too, along with a burst of ripe tomatoes. There’s a touch of sweetness in the sauce but that’s not a bad thing. It tempers down the heat, which is like that good type of spicy chili that will make your nose run if you eat enough of it.

This is a robust sauce that’s appropriately balanced with spice, sweetness, and acidity. It’s also a sauce that can easily amp up the flavor on any kind of pasta dish.

Bottom Line:

If you’re bored with that same-old-same, last-minute pasta you like to make on a Tuesday night, this is something that’s is wholly flavorful and gourmet quality. Spice up your pasta night with a jar of this stuff.

Last year, Freddie Gibbs and The Alchemist teamed up for their joint album, Alfredo. The project was labeled as one of 2020’s best hip-hop albums, a title that was upheld by its eventual Best Rap Album Grammy nomination for this year’s show. In a little over 24 hours, Freddie Gibbs and The Alchemist will learn whether or not they will get their first Grammy award thanks to the album, but before that happens, the two brought their talents to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to perform “Scottie Beam,” a favorite from Alfredo.

Rather than keep things simple with a straightforward performance, Freddie and Alchemist opted to spice things up. The duo, accompanied by a few other guests, took their seats around a dinner table to wine and dine as Freddie performed “Scottie Beam.” The group was also served a meal of alfredo pasta which they appropriately enjoyed during the set. Rick Ross, who has a verse on the song, was not present for the performance.

Freddie and Alchemist’s appearance on The Tonight Show comes after they performed at the first-ever Black Music Collective pre-Grammy event on Thursday. They took the stage alongside names like HER, PJ Morton, and Yolanda Adams.

Watch the performance in the video above.

Freddie Gibbs is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

When Avengers: Endgame surpassed Avatar two years back as history’s highest grossing movie (not adjusted for inflation!), it was by a slim margin. Endgame made $2,797,800,564 worldwide; Avatar made $2,790,439,092. If you don’t want to do the math, that’s a mere $7.82 million difference. So when it was announced that James Cameron’s sci-fi epic was getting a re-release in China this weekend, it seemed all but inevitable that Endgame would have to surrender the throne.

And so it has: According to Deadline, it took all of as day for the Avatar reissue to gross $8.9 million — more than enough to fly by Thanos et al. (In a sense, it’s not that big a deal: Both films are now owned by the same mega-corporation, Disney, who procured Marvel years ago and Fox semi-recently.)

So congrats to Avatar! And just in time for…another year and a half till we see that first of several sequels!

Now here’s where we tell you that technically speaking, neither is really the highest grossing movie ever made — at least when you adjust all grosses for inflation. The winner is still Gone with the Wind, whose total gross in 2021 dollars is $3.7 billion. Avatar came out in 2009, 12 whole years ago, so its gross now would be $3.25 billion — still a ways away from Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler. Endgame, meanwhile, is only number five — after Titanic, also from James Cameron, but before The Sound of Music. Still, kudos…for now, until Marvel whimsically dumps Endgame back in theaters.

(Via Deadline)

The sound you just heard was the entire city of Philadelphia breathing a huge sigh of relief. According to multiple media reports, Joel Embiid, who hyperextended his left knee on Friday night in the Philadelphia 76ers’ 127-101 win over the Washington Wizards, managed to avoid any major structural damage that would potentially put him on the sideline for an extended period of time.

Adrian Wojnarowski and Ramona Shelburne of ESPN bring word that Embiid only suffered a bone bruise in his left knee, while his meniscus and various ligaments are all fine.

Shams Charania of The Athletic then provided a timetable, saying that Embiid is not expected to miss any more than a few weeks as he recovers from the injury.

Whether or not the Sixers, which sit in first place in the Eastern Conference by one game ahead of the Brooklyn Nets, opt to give Embiid extra time to rest and recover is a separate question, but seeing as how he was on the ground in serious pain when he went down, the fact that he’ll only miss a few weeks is a gigantic boost for the team. Embiid has arguably been the MVP frontrunner this season, averaging 29.9 points, 11.5 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 1.4 blocks, and 1.2 steals in 32.6 minutes per game this season.

Anderson .Paak is back in the spotlight. He recently joined forces with Bruno Mars as Silk Sonic to release their first joint single, “Leave The Door Open,” ahead of their upcoming album. The project will join a growing list of collaborations that .Paak has done with some of the industry’s best, including Kendrick Lamar and Dr. Dre. He worked with the former on their 2018 single, “Tints,” while the latter served as an executive producer on his 2018 album, Oxnard. In a recent sit-down with Esquire, .Paak shared an update about the two normally quiet Compton-based acts.

“We talk just through texts and just off and on,” he said about Lamar. “I always check on him and the family and make sure he’s good. He’s always responsive, and just like, just let me know he’s hanging in there just like everybody else.” .Paak also had positive things to say about Dre, who suffered a brain aneurysm at the beginning of the year.

“Dre’s having a good-ass time,” he said in regards to Dre’s quarantine life. “That’s already his life—isolation, working all the time. I think he was probably used to it. But he’s having fun now because a lot of people have more time on their hands, so they can come visit him and make music with big Uncle Dre.” As for their own collaborations, Paak said Dre has taken a step back is “letting me fly and figure it out.”

Elsewhere, the Oxnard-bred act discussed his upcoming fifth album. “With this new material you’re going to get some real topics, and you’re going to get some substance, but mixed with some great grooves,” he said. .Paak also expressed his desire to collaborate with popular K-pop band, BTS.

“I’m working on trying to get that plug, man,” he said. “If you know of any way, let me know, bro.”

Bruno Mars is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.