Tonight's third annual "Shake Your Mac and Cheese Night" at the Wachovia Spectrum will give another meaning to comfort food.

Those attending the Phantoms vs. Hershey game that starts at 7:05 p.m. are invited to bring in food of any sort and drop it off at the door. All except for the mac and cheese, which fans are welcome to use as noisemakers during the game and then make the donation on the way out. Everything contributed goes to Philabundance, a nonprofit group that distributes donated food to the needy. Making others a little more comfortable is where it's at, particularly over the next month and a half.

"People just bring mac and cheese and whatever else, we're taking anything," Phantoms PR director Brian Smith said yesterday, "and bring the macaroni and cheese in, and during the game just sorta go nuts with it. Make as much noise as you can and on the way out, we'll have bins there for people to drop them in."

Smith said they have gotten several hundred boxes the previous 2 years, along with cans and other goods that the needy can use. It's one of several food drives the sports complex's teams sponsor; the Flyers, for instance, are asking fans to bring a frozen turkey or a coupon for a one to Saturday night's game at the Center against the Coyotes.

"We do food drives a couple times a year," Smith said. "I'm sure we'll do another one in December. I know last year we did our December food drive in response to one . . . somebody put out a call, 'hey, we don't have any food, we need some help.' The whole conglomerate here, all three of our teams, did a food drive withi n the next week. When we do them we usually do them this time of year. There's this, then one around the holidays. And we'll have a similar thing with toys. Tots for Tots coming up with the Marines in December as well."  

So the question remains: Do those noisemakers turn the contents into mac and cheese bits? Smith laughed. "I don't know," he said. "I'll have to open up a box after the game and see."