Trader Joe’s Paneer Masala Naan
Posted: March 24, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 4 stars, bread, cheesey naan, indian food, masala, naan, paneer, Trader Joe's 8 Comments
Yum… cheesy naan…
Trader Joe’s continues to deliver high-quality Indian food with their latest offering – Trader Joe’s Paneer Masala Naan. When it comes to Indian food, TJ’s always seems to get it about right – whether that be their Aloo Chaat Kati Pouches or their Uttapam, so it was a thrill to see a new and delicious Indian bread available to try.
While at first Indian food names seem to be dense and intimidating, as soon as you start picking up some key phrases they are actually pleasantly direct (much easier to parse than, say, direct Chinese translations of food, which tend to more poetically reference clouds, ears, or quasi-mythic generals) Paneer meaning cheese, Masala meaning a blend of spices, and Naan, of course, meaning bread.
Combine those three terms, as they have here, and you’re left with that tasty, chewy, oblong flat bread we all know and love, but somehow stuffed with cheese, diced onion and plenty of savory spices. “A cheese stuffed naan?” you’re no doubt, asking yourself incredulously. Yes, sit down, a cheese stuffed naan – but stuffed classy-like. This isn’t some Taco Bell-style molten “cheez” filled dough snack, it’s a scrumptious, shareable, understated addition to your classy Indian or South East Asian inspired dinner. The cheese, for one, is present only in a reserved quantity – a thin layer that effuses throughout the soft and chewy bread rather than glue it together.
In fact, apart from the appealingly moist texture the cheese lends the naan, you won’t notice it as much as you will the masala spice mix. The onion is the clearest participant, showing up well-cooked and diced so as not to sting the tongue, and it’s complemented nicely by coriander, green chili, ginger, and the other miscellaneous spices that TJ’s doesn’t bother to delineate on the label but which likely include fennel, cardamom, nutmeg, and more in small, measured quantities.
Naan is one of the most delicious forms of bread in existence, when done right, and Trader Joe’s does it right here, perfectly balancing crispiness with moist toothsomeness. You will want to make sure you pop it in your oven for long enough to ensure it is heated through and through – a good 10 – 15 minutes or so. Sure, it would be preferable if you could just microwave it, but good food is seldom microwaved.
Trader Joe’s claims they’re able to deliver on such high-quality Indian food, time after time, because they actually have their food hand-made in India itself. In this case, their naan hails from that Jewel of the West, Gujarat on the west coast of the subcontinent. You should be thrilled to hear because, one, it means you’re getting authentic hand-made Indian food in your local grocery store, but also because, two, it gives us a chance to talk about the Great Rann of Kutch!
We briefly covered the marvelous Thar Desert a while back, and those endless salt flats known as the Rann of Kutch which borders it to the south. This unique ecoregion is home to the graceful, loping nilgai, and is fed by the sinuous Luni River and I haven’t made up even one word in this whole paragraph. All of these things are real things. I would strongly argue that the Great Rann of Kutch has the single best geographic name of any location on Earth, beating out even the Forth of Firth, and Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwll-llantysiliogogogoch. And basically, folks, if that doesn’t get you in the mood to eat some naan, I’m not sure what to tell you.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend It: Yes, this is some good naan.
Would I Buy It Again: Yup, it’s perfect for sopping broth, grippin’ chicken or just eating by itself.
Final Synopsis: Cheese and herb stuffed naan – what’s not to like.
Trader Joe’s Paneer Masala Naan – Nutrition Facts
Trader Joe’s Fair Trade Organic Rooibos and Honeybush Tea
Posted: March 20, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 2 stars, fair trade, herbal tea, honeybush, Organic, rooibos tea, Tea, Trader Joe's 10 Comments
Fair trade…organic…kosher… Surely all these organization wouldn’t put their seal of approval on an underwhelming tea, right?
It’s been a while since we looked at Trader Joe’s tea selection. And honestly, that’s because Trader Joe’s teas run a little hot and cold. On the one hand I’m a huge fan of Trader Joe’s Spiced Chai Tea and their Autumn Harvest blend. On the other hand you have more, shall we say, lackluster offerings like their wretched Tropical Sweetened Matcha. When I saw the new gorgeous box of Trader Joe’s Fair Trade Organic Rooibos and Honeybush Tea, I was immediately on board. Surely with box art this bold, this dynamic, surely it must be one of the good teas. Right?
Look, let’s start out with the positive stuff.
Fair trade products are worth supporting. As it turns out, corporations are incredibly good at exploiting the unrepresented and voiceless – particularly if the people being exploited are a continent or two away from the eventual consumer. In the same way that fair trade chocolate is important to developing sustainable economies (and environments) in Africa, fair trade tea is worth supporting. Also it’s organic, so that’s good too. Organic and Fairtrade – two strong, good adjectives leading us off right out the gate.The problem is that the product title doesn’t’ stop there, because then we get to the “rooibos” part.
I don’t do this often on this blog, but I’m going to make some strident, potentially divisive claims based more on personal opinion then objective polls of larger social trends. Rooibos tea is terrible. In the same way that people have risen to the defense of Trader Joe’s heavily sweetened corn-only salsa, I’m sure there are die-hard rooibos tea lovers who are going to take umbrage with this statement. To me however, rooibos tea taste like wet carboard. That was the first thought I had the first time I tried it, and it is the same thought I have had every time since. Rooibos tea tastes exactly like sucking on the paper stick of a Tootsie Roll Pop until it turns to mush.
Rooibos is an herbal tea, which means it isn’t a real tea made from the leaves of tea plants, but instead from the clippings of a broom-like scrub plant that grows in South Africa. It has been steadily growing in popularity the last few years because of…. something. I don’t know.
I honestly do not understand why people drink this tea, and I have regretted the purchase every time I picked it up. I had hopes that the promise of “Honeybush” being present in this Rooibos and Honeybush tea might make for a different experience. It does not. Honeybush is another South African bush commonly said to taste just like the rooibos bush only “a little sweeter”. “Little” being the important adjective in this phrase, meaning “not actually noticeably sweet at all”.
Here’s the other thing I think is weird. It takes an incredible amount of rooibos to brew even a single cup of rooibos tea. The given brewing instructions are to let one tea bag steep in your cup for 6 full minutes before you try sipping it. For a pot of tea they recommend adding one tea bag per person, and letting the pot steep for 8 minutes. That’s an extremely long soak. I dare you to try that with a bag of Trader Joe’s Original Irish Breakfast Tea, let alone several bags. After 6 minutes, the tea would be strong enough to overpower you in fight.
Again, yes the box is beautiful, the bags are beautiful, and even the box itself is well designed – incorporating a natural hinge and an exceptionally clever self-locking flap. The only problem is that I feel I would be just as well off gumming the edge of the box until it turns to pulp as I would be actually brewing the contents.
I may be well off the mark on this one – I’m willing to believe that someone loves this tea – it’s just that it it has any positive qualities I’m completely blind to them.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend It: This is very unlikely.
Would I Buy It Again: I don’t think so. If I get the hankering for rooibos again I reckon I can always just chew on an index card.
Final Synopsis: Rooibos tea always tastes like wet cardboard to me.
Crushed by too much work! No post today, sorry :(
Posted: March 19, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand Leave a commentThe headline says it all guys. Will treat you to a new post soon – just consider this a chance to exercise the art of patience!
Oh no – too much work!
Trader Joe’s Partially Popped Popcorn!
Posted: March 17, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 3 stars, Gluten-Free, Kosher, popcorn, Snacks, Trader Joe's 5 Comments
Coming soon, Trader Joe’s Just Watermelon Seeds!
Trader Joe’s Partially Popped Popcorn? Trader Joe’s Partially Popped Popcorn! Not only has TJ’s brought us a new product that sounds absolutely insane, but judging by the exclamation marks, they’re very excited to being doing so.
Trader Joe’s Partiall yPopped Popcorn is, astoundingly, exactly what it sounds like. Ever tried to pop a bag of popcorn in a microwave? You know htose partially popped kernles that are lawys left on the botto? That’s what this is. An entire bag of nothing but popcorn rejects. Essentially, Trader JOe’s has hit on the idea of selling you some of the trash you would normally throw out.
But wait. Is it trash? After all, who among us hasn’t found themselves idly trying to munch on some of the half-budded misfit kernels when all the good popcorn is gone. Is it true that not only have you tried to eat these kernels, but that maybe, every now and then, you have found one that was semi-popped in just the right way, formed just enought that it crunched beneath the teeth with an enjoyable, salty little crunch?
Friends and readers, I’m shocked to see myself write this, but Trader Joe’s Partially Popped Popcorn is not just good, but strangely addicting. –addicting in the weirdly compulsive way that leads you to repeatedly chawing on those partially cooked kernels in your own Pop Secret bag. The difference here is that the kernels in this bag are all precisely cooked as to be half-popped, fully roasted and pleasantly chompable, without any molar-busting, underdone seeds in the mix. The result is more like a roasted Corn Nut than anything else. They have about that same level of sturdy, hard-shelled integrity, that gives way to a crunchy, salty core after a brief moment of tense, inter-dental resistance.
A nutty crunchy, salty, snack – that’s what these really are at the bottom of it, despite their strange origins. Maybe Trader Joe’s isn’t peddling us their rejects, so much as they’ve discovered a previously untapped resource.
The Breakdown:
Would I Recommend Them: It’d be hard to, without being laughed at.
Would I Buy Them Again: Yeah, I would. I love Corn Nuts.
Final Synopsis: Basically smaller, off-brand Corn Nuts.
Trader Joe’s Partially Popped Popcorn – Nutrition Facts
Trader Joe’s Sweet & Salty Kettle Popped Popcorn Chips with Whole Grain, Chia Seeds, Flax Seeds, Whole Quinoa and Sunflower Seeds
Posted: March 12, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 2 stars, chia seeds, Chips, flax seeds, popcorn, quinoa, Snacks, sunflower seeds, Trader Joe's 3 Comments
Yeah go ahead, might as well throw some flax seeds in there too.
Trader Joe’s doesn’t care if everyone else is giving their food products catchy, memorable or even easily paresable names. No, what they’re going for is completionism, and they aren’t going to stop adding words to their product name until it contains as many ingredients as they can get away with. Thus is the case with TJ’s Kettle Popped Popcorn chips – a sweet and salty hybrid snack that dares ask the question, “What would happen if you tried making tortilla chips out of kettle corn?”
I may slight Trader Joe’s for their gaffs, but I love them for just these feats of daring audacity. Obviously no sane person would try to take fully popped sweet and salt kettle corn, then try and compress them down into flat discs. Leave the popcorn to the popcorn and the chips to the chips, the average consumer might say – their sense of normalcy firmly ingrained by the stream of mundane products churned out by mainstream grocers. Not only has TJ’s just made chips out of popcorn, but they went ahead and started throwing in whole fistfuls of quinoa, sunflower seeds, and chia seeds in as well. I’m going to give them full points for thinking outside the box on this one.
That said, are they any good. Well, as you might imagine from such a hybrid snack, it does many things serviceably, but nothing amazingly. While shaped like chips, they certainly don’t behave like chips. That is to say, these popcorn chips can’t be dipped or dunked. Their popcorn nature makes them much to fragile for that. The only thing that the chip nature is good for is to give a home for all the seeds.
The scattering of quinoa, sunflower, and flax seeds give the otherwise ordinary kettle corn a nuttier taste and a sort of extra intriguing crunch. However, because the chips are so fragile they tend to break up immediately in the mouth, so there isn’t really much time to appreciate it. I like the idea of mixing in those seeds, but unlike, say, Trader Joe’s Super Seeded Tortilla Chips, these just don’t hang around long enough to have much of an impact. It almost seems like a waste of the seeds, and an unnecessary source of additional fat.
The kettle corn itself is quite tasty – just the right amount of salty and sweet that makes it such a treat. However, it begs the question, why wouldn’t I just buy a regular bag of kettle corn if that’s what I was after? The only real advantage, as far as I see, is that it’s easier to be aware of how many “chips” you eat. Regular popcorn is such an amorphous collection of tiny things that I tend to eat more than I realize- munching down kernel after kernel. In chip form it’s easier to realize “Whoops – that was a dozen chips, better lay off.”
Ultimately, Trader Joe’s Kettle Popped Sweet and Salty Popcorn Chips are an interesting new snack, but fail to make a strong case for buying a second bag.
The Breakdown:
Would I Recommend It: No, just go pick up some regular kettle corn.
Would I Buy It Again: I’d give it a pass.
Final Synopsis: Tasty kettle corn, compressed into an unnecessary disc shape.
Trader Joe’s Sweet and Salty Kettle Popped Popcorn Chips – Nutrition Facts
Trader Joe’s 0% Frozen Vanilla Greek Fat Free Yogurt
Posted: March 10, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 4 stars, fat free, frozen yogurt, ice cream, Trader Joe's Brand, vanilla, yogurt 2 Comments
Same purple packaging as the non-frozen variety. Consistency – I like it.
Sometimes Trader Joe’s nails the names, as with their Avacado’s Number guacamole, other times, as with Trader Joe’s 0% Frozen Vanilla Greek Fat Free Yogurt, they’re just being confusing. I dare you to parse that mangled phrase. 0% frozen, vanilla Greek, fat free yogurt. So obviously we’re talking about a 100% melted, fat free yogurt with the flavor of vanilla Greeks, right? This isn’t the first time Trader Joe’s has been syntactically confusing in their product titles (see Italian Blood Orange Soda, Thai Lime Shrimp, and French Berry Lemonade) but it is probably the most egregious. Just call it Fat-Free Greek Frozen Yogurt, you guys!
At any rate, I was excited to see this on the shelves because, like my father and his father before him, I love that froyo! The low calorie, low fat version of ice cream, frozen yogurt is the salvation of anyone craving a frozen treat.
Trader Joe’s offers ordinary non-fat Greek yogurt in vanilla already, and this frozen variety is incredibly similar. It’s as if they took the yogurt available in the refrigerated case and just cooled it a few more degrees. I’m a big fan of TJ’s non-fat Greek Yogurts, going so far as to live my life by a yogurt clock, so I was basically won over as soon as I saw this.
The frozen Greek yogurt capitalizes on all the best qualities of the non-frozen variety – it’s creamy, dense, and sweet (but not too sweet!) with a mellow tone of vanilla set against the yogurt tang. It certainly isn’t the sort of sweet creaminess you’d get from a dairy vanilla ice cream, but frozen yogurt isn’t trying to be that. And at a scanty 100 calories per 1/2 cup and no fat, it doesn’t have to be.
I enjoyed this frozen yogurt in its own right, but it’s a basic enough taste that it can easy be dressed up with all the usual ice cream toppings, bits of crushed candy sweets, or even strawberries, raspberries, ripe peaches or plums. I mean, anything really, man. We live in a free and crazy age of bold experimentation – I can’t think of a reason not to pick up a tub of this and go completely nuts.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend It: For sure – no fat, few calories and sweet frozen goodness. That’s all good.
Would I Buy It Again: Well, I finished eating this one already, so yeah.
Final Synopsis: Pretty much exactly like the frozen version of TJ’s regular 0% fat Greek yogurt.
Trader Joe’s Fat Free Frozen Vanilla Greek Yogurt – Nutrition Facts
Trader Joe’s Crispy Green Curry Shrimp Gyoza
Posted: March 5, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand Leave a comment
It’s gyoza – but crispy! And with green curry… and kale… and, hmm…
Interesting, bold and exotic – Trader Joe’s Crispy Green Curry Shrimp Gyoza have a lot to offer – but they don’t quite manage to deliver.
I certainly love the idea of these gyoza – seafood, curry and Asian veggies all done up in a crispy dumpling – but while the idea sounds amazing on paper that’s a lot of moving parts to get just right. While by no means a disaster, these gyoza are more mundane than mind blowing.
Just to get this out there first – I love that Trader Joe’s comes out with daring products like this. If there’s a world where Trader Joe’s isn’t putting green curry and shrimp into gyoza I’m glad I don’t live in it. That said, as much as I wanted to like these I found myself underwhelmed. Previously I took a look at Trader Joe’s Thai Shrimp Gyoza, which I really enjoyed. Unfortunately, this time they’ve pushed their winning equation too far. The addition of curry, plus a change to the filling, plus a strangely crunchy shell results in a gyoza that doesn’t do anything particularly well.
Given the golden, crispy exterior – I’m not sure it makes sense to call these “gyoza” at all. While they share the shape, the texture and taste no longer resembles the chewy, tender pot sticker at all. Instead, we’re given a crunchy outer shell that has more in common with pie crust. That’s not a bad thing, a crispy crunchy shell would have been amazing if the gyoza contained some sort of soft, gooey filling. However, it seems out of place here where the filling is already so chewy and challenging.
That filling is a mixture of big shrimp chunks and big pieces of kale. Kale, really? Yes indeed – along with the more traditional lemon grass, limp pieces of well-cooked kale makes a big showing here. What’s more, unlike TJ’s Thai Shrimp Gyoza where they shrimp was an understated, mild presence these crispy goyza feature big chunks of shrimp you can’t miss. That should be a selling point, and it probably would be, if the shrimp could stand on their own. Instead, the shrimp runs up against the green curry and, yes, the kale, in a way that doesn’t really mesh all that well.
The curry is a good green curry to be be sure – you’ll definitely taste the coconut milk in it along with the cumin, turmeric, nuanced hits of ginger, kaffir lime peel, and lemon grass. And while it’s good, there isn’t enough of it to hold its own against the other flavors that are going on, nor enough to take prominence over the shrimp flavor. More like a dab of green curry in a gyoza, instead of a gyoza green curry.
What you end up with is a dumpling that ends up doing nothing all that well. The crunchy exterior is pretty good, but doesn’t go that well with the veggie-shrimpy filling. The shrimp is fine, but doesn’t match all that great with the curry sauce. The curry sauce is okay, but there isn’t enough of it to pull the whole thing together. Trader Joe’s has a pretty diverse selection of gyoza nowadays, from chicken and pork gyoza, to vegetarian gyoza. The next time I’m in a gyoza mood, I’ll be skipping these for one of those classics.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend It: Not really, there are better gyoza available.
Would I Buy It Again: I’ll stick with the authentic gyoza, thanks.
Final Synopsis: Hybrind quasi-gyoza that fail to make a case for their own existence.
Trader Joe’s Crispy Green Curry Shrimp Gyoza – Nutritional Facts
Trader Joe’s Cookie Butter Sandwich Cookies
Posted: March 3, 2015 Filed under: COOKIE BUTTER!, Cookies, Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 4 stars, cookie butter, Cookies, Trader Joe's 1 Comment
Trader Joe’s is just daring you to FREAK OUT!
Hold the presses! Hold the presses once again folks, for Trader Joe’s has unleashed a new form of cookie butter delivery system upon the world. This time they’ve packaged their joyful condiment in the form of Trader Joe’s Cookie Butter Sandwich Cookies – a delicious butter cookie / cookie butter sandwich.
If you’re not familiar with cookie butter, and that would truly be tragedy, you can better educate yourself on the topic here, here, here, here and here. Basically any time Trader Joe’s develops some new application of this most delicious cookie spread I will be there to buy it. If you don’t have the time to work your way through the backlog of posts, the tl;dr version goes like this:
Cookie Butter is like peanut butter – only it’s made from the delicious European cookie speculoos instead of peanuts. It tastes so good that once you eat it you will generate a sort of free-floating anger at the world for not inventing it sooner. HOWEVER – cookie butter is also a curse. It is so truly wonderful in and of itself that combining it with anything only seems to dilute its goodness.
The sorry truth is that the best way to enjoy Cookie Butter is to just spoon it directly into your mouth like a decadent Roman emperor. Trader Joe’s has tried numerous times to improve upon cookie butter, and each time they have failed. Cookie butter and Nutella failed, Oreo cookie butter fell short, and even Cookie Butter Cheesecake fell short of the mark set by a simple spoonful of cookie butter, eaten all by itself.
Nevertheless, Trader Joe’s refuses to give up on the dream of improving cookie butter. Which leads to the periodic release of new developments such as our speciment today – Cookie sandwiches with cookie butter.
As pretty as macaroons but way better tasting.
How did they do this time? Well, first off, it’s cookie butter, so it’s pretty damn good. More specifically, however, it’s really damn good. It’s hard to see where they could improve on these sandwich cookies. Two simple, but sweet and flaky butter cookies are sandwiched around a thick swathe of divine cookie butter. The result is a really handy way to get cookie butter into your mouth without getting your fingers sticky.
It’s in the use of plain butter cookies that Trader Joe’s really succeeds on this count. I’m sure that someone suggested using speculoos cookies for the two cookie halves, they may have even tried it, but that would only have muddled the decadent cookie butter taste. On the other hand, these basic butter cookies simply stay out of the way. They provide a nice crunch, and a nice mild sweetness but don’t get in the way of the main attraction. You really taste the cookie butter in these cookies, and not much else. That shows that TJ’s is learning. Come for the cookie butter and get the cookie butter- it’s an easy formula but a winning one.
There’s only one point I found myself disappointed on – and that is dunkability. With any sandwich cookie – oreo or otherwise – the mind immediately turns to a glass of cool, dunkable milk. Now there are certainly a plurality of theories on the perfect way to dunk a cookie, but the general consensus holds that you want a sort of al dente toothsomeness – yielding but not too soft. Unfortunately, the butter cookies involved here don’t lend themselves to that at all. Denser and not as porous as an Oreo, you’ll have to hold one of these cookies under the surface a long time before they even start absorbing milk. The butter cookies give you that “water off a ducks back” phenomenon, keeping the core resolutely dry no matter how much you dunk. Phooey. If they’d stuck the landing it would have been a solid 5 star performance.
Are these cookie sandwiches any better than cookie butter by itself? Not better, but almost as good – and that’s saying something. By keeping it clean and simple, you end up getting that same delightful cookie butter taste, with a bit of added crunchiness. If you want to think of these as a great all around cookie to serve anytime, or as a less barbaric way to get your cookie butter intake, you wouldn’t be poorly served. You can chalk this up as another “W” on the cookie butter scoreboard.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend It: Yes, this is an awesome new way to eat cookie butter.
Would I Buy It Again: Definitely, if I could trust myself around it.
Final Synopsis: Delicious cookie butter sandwiched between two pleasantly low key butter cookies.
Trader Joe’s Cookie Butter Sandwich Cookies – Nutrition Facts
Trader Joe’s Reduced Guilt Chicken Salad with White Meat
Posted: February 26, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 3 stars, Chicken, chicken salad, Salad, Trader Joe's 2 Comments
Finally, a chicken salad that can reduce my guilt.
We’ve talked about Trader Joe’s reduced guilt offerings before. In fact, we talked about one earlier this week. As I mentioned then, the problem inherent in “low cal” versions of fattier food, is that they tend to negate themselves. In general, if I’m going to eat a creamy, sugary, salty brownie or whatever, I have steeled myself to the fact that I’m blowing my diet, if at least for the moment. But I’m willing to do it, because it tastes so damn good. Or I at least hope it tastes that good. The problem with our reduced guilt guacamole, or whatever, is that by taking out all the fat and sugar, you’re taking out all the stuff that makes it taste so good. The result is that I’m left sitting there, scooping watery psudeo-guac into my mouth, still getting fat, just not as quickly, but not enjoying myself nearly as much.
So almost always when I see the “diet” version of an otherwise unhealthy food I immediately assume I’m not going to enjoy myself. However, there is a tricky little bit of math here. On the graph of healthfulness vs. tastiness, every now and then there’s a diet food that manages to fall just on the right side of the curve. The “Inner Beans” snack we explored yesterday managed to do this (debatably). Can Trader Joe’s Reduced Guilt Chicken Salad do the same?
To cut to the chase – no, it doesn’t. This new salad is a classic case of close, but not quite. And really, that shouldn’t be a surprise. Often times these “reduced guilt” formulations offer underwhelming health benefits like “15% less sodium!” or “Now only 72% fat by volume!”. Trader Joe’s Reduced Guilt Chicken Salad swings for the fences, offering an insane reduction in both calories and fat. On the label it proudly states that this chicken salad has 85% less fat and 60% fewer calories than their regular chicken salad. An 85% reduction in fat and less than half the calories – from 19 grams of fat per serving to 2.5, and down 250 calories to 100. That’s insane. You’d think you’re getting a tub with about a teaspoon of chicken salad in it but nope, they’ve filled it all the way to the top.
How did they achieve this miracle? In this case, the answer is they took out all the mayonnaise and replaced it with low fat greek yogurt. It’s a bold, crazy move – and it doesn’t really pay off. While the calories might be reasonable, there’s not tang or zip to the salad. Instead it just tastes flat. The chicken is there, the chopped vegetables are there, but there isn’t much beyond that. The result is something that tastes like a chicken vegetable soup without enough salt in it.
For some people this is probably not a deal breaker. If you’re looking for an interesting cracker topping, or a healthy side to have with lunch this will fit the bill. For me,however, this chicken salad just isn’t quite interesting enough to justify future purchases.
The Breakdown:
Would I Recommend It: Yeah… I guess so. Healthy chicken salad is probably worth a nod.
Would I Buy It Again: No, I thought it was a little too mushy and boring.
Final Synopsis: A very low cal, if bland, chicken salad.
Trader Joe’s Embrace Your Inner Bean
Posted: February 24, 2015 Filed under: Trader Joe's Brand | Tags: 3 stars, beans, Snacks, Trader Joe's Leave a comment
Such a confusing bag, Trader Joe’s. Are they implying the bean’s inner bean is fried bean puffs? Wouldn’t it be the other way around? C’mon TJ, let’s try to tighten it up in the future.
I really feel like Trader Joe’s Inner Bean fails on multiple levels. Namely, two levels. It isn’t a very tasty snack, and the name is confusing gibberish that makes people angry. Nevertheless, there is something interesting going on here, and that is worth looking at.
Let’s lay out all the problems first and see if we can figure this out. First, What does “embrace your inner bean” mean? I assume Trader Joe’s must have a reason for putting a perplexing quasi-pun on the package, but I can seriously not understand why. Yes, I know that they sell a similar snack called “Contemplate Inner Peas”. Yes, I get that this bean snack is a spiritual successor to that pea snack. The crucial difference is that while “contemplate inner peace” is a phrase you might expect someone to be familiar with, “Embrace your inner being” is confusing even with the whole bean part left out. It’s just a very, very strange name that tells you nothing about the product except that it involves beans somehow and that, apparently, Trader Joe’s has very high ideals for them.
Even if TJ gave this snack a purely descriptive name, like “Trader Joe’s Air-Puffed Bean Snack”, it would still have some hurdles to clear. What, after all, is an air-puffed bean snack? Well basically, as you will see if you buy this bag, a Cheeto that is made from milled black beans instead of corn. The result is something that does not look or taste very much like Cheetos at all.
Despite the airy content of each crisp, these bean snacks are surprisingly rigid and dense. If you want to chow down on some of these you really have to commit to the bite. In fact, the extreme structural integrity of these ostensibly grab-‘em-‘n-munch’em fun snacks inspired me to construct a small but sturdy tower from the bean treats and see how many cans of Coke it could support. Stacking the bean puffs into a Lincoln-log style cabin, I was able to stack nearly 3 cans of coke before the structure collapsed – a feat that I doubt even Flamin’ Hot Cheetos could replicate.
Taste-wise, Embrace Your Inner Beans are much more approachable. The beans have been seasoned with salt and a dash of pepper that scratches that salty snack food itch. These crunchable bean nuggets will pass snuff for any typical junk food chip at first blush. They’ve got that sort of generic, fried starchiness common to potato chips, Cheetoes, Bugles, etc. However, this taste quickly gives way to the tell-tail mealy, bean taste common to lentils everywhere. It’s not a bad bean taste – it’s just a bean taste. If you’re okay with that in your snack food, then that’s not a problem. If, on the other hand, you don’t want to be reminded of beans while pigging out, this is something to be aware of. They are, more than anything, like a dry crispy version of salted edamame.
Taste aside, there’s one area where these bean snacks excel, and that’s in the calorie count. If you wanted to sit down and pig out on this entire bag, it would only cost you less than 400 calories, while simultaneously packing in 15 grams of protein. Calorie-wise, that’s equivalent to less than 1/2 of one fun-sized bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. Despite the name, despite the hard exterior, these beans are amazingly healthy for a fried food, and still manage to satisfy that gluttonous little voice that demands salt fat all day long. Trader Joe’s has a wide variety of “reduced guilt” or “healthy” alternatives to more fattening snack foods, but generally speaking, it’s a trade off that isn’t worth it. In this case, Trader Joe’s Embrace Your Inner Beans hits that sweet spot of “healthy enough” and “tasty enough” – and that’s a rare combination.
The Breakdown
Would I Recommend Them: Yes, these are a good healthy snack… if you’re okay with beans.
Would I Buy Them Again: No, these are too bean-y for me.
Final Synopsis: Like healthier, bean-based Cheetos.
Trader Joe’s Embrace Your Inner Bean – Nutrition Facts
Eating At Joes 
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