Since it's easy to prepare and so versatile, I cook pasta at least once a week. Lately, I've been experimenting with various sauces and pasta shapes to see how the factors make a difference in taste, so I gave La Famiglia DelGrosso a try.

I sampled three of eight different sauces, all of which have kitschy titles named after family members. My boyfriend thought Aunt Mary Ann's Sunday Marinara was "light on flavor," but I preferred it to its competitors. A Trader Joe's pomodoro sauce tasted sickly sweet in comparison. Uncle Joe's Vodka Celebration was my favorite of the bunch: the texture was creamy, but the sauce wasn't as light in color as most commercial vodka sauces, which often are too heavy on cream.

The sauce possessed a strong umami quality (incidentally, tomatoes contain high amounts of umami). Uncle Bo's Roasted Red Pepper Tour was made with — you guessed it — roasted red peppers, and it was my sweetie's favorite of the three because of its deep, smoky flavor.

Certainly no commercial variety can replace a homemade pasta sauce, but La Famiglia sauces work in a pinch. They are available at select Whole Foods and other grocers across the country. Have you tried any of the brand's flavors? What did you think of them?