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Showing posts with label veggies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label veggies. Show all posts

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Trader Joe's Mango, Red Quinoa and Chicken Salad

Given that my last review covered both chocolate-covered potato chips AND pumpkin cheesecake, does it really surprise you that I thought to myself, "Hmm, maybe I should eat a salad?"

Salad can mean a lot of different things, of course. Perhaps it's a simple bed of greens and some light dressing. Maybe there's a flower-shaped radish around or it's heaped with croutons and Bacos (ugh) or it's every veggie in the book. Know what a traditional-style Pittsburgh salad is? Take lettuce, tomatoes, onions and other assorted veggies, toss together, then top with a half metric ton of cheese and a large mitt full of fries, top with some type of meat (sometimes steak, I prefer buffalo chicken) and then drowned in dressing (ranch or bleu cheese, usually, for me)..delicious, though not exactly healthy, and it
renders the consumer immobile for about three hours afterwards.

A faithful reader on our Facebook page (if you're not a fan yet, why not? Click the thingy at the bottom!) tipped me off to the TJ's Mango, Red Quinoa and Chicken Salad, which sounded both delicious AND healthy to me. Like other really long named items, I'm just going to shorten this to the TJMRQCS from here on out. On a solo shopping trip, I got two of these, one for me and one for Sandy, with the intention that we have them for a work lunch, and for $3.99 each, not a terrible deal.

Let me t
ell you: I love this salad. It's tasty in pretty much every way possible. Open it up, and the bowl is literally packed with baby spinach which is crisp and leafy and fresh, with some carrot strings and diced onion. That's it for the veggie portion of the salad - simple yet fresh and tasty, and there's a deceptively copious amount of it in there. The mango? It's aside in a little cup, chopped up and ready to go on, and firm and sweet. Perfect. The red quinoa? Lots of it. It tends to tumble down towards the bottom, of course, but while kinda easy for the palate to skip over, it's there serving its role perfectly, adding some weight and merit to the whole package. And the chicken? I'll admit, it looks a little funky at first, kinda like it got marinated in lemon-lime Gatorade, with nary a noticeable explanation for its isotopic appearance on the label. Read the back a bit, or channel your inward intrepid food adventurer like me and just chomp on down, and you'll realize it's yellow curried to add a rich flavor dimension. And unlike other TJ dishes that tend to skimp on the meat, there's a pretty good, I'd even say appropriate, amount. And lastly, the coconut chile dressing...man. It kinda caught me off guard the first time I sampled it. You see, it starts out sweet and mellow, like coconut milk, with some mango (and perhaps lime) flavor, bordering on almost too sweet, before it drops the people's elbow with a load of chile-laden spice that I wouldn't have anticipated. It's absolutely fantastic tastewise, though it's kinda like slightly-watery mayo in its composure, so it plops instead of pours. I suppose you can dip your forkful instead, but when you also have quinoa, that makes it a harder task to complete successfully. That's the only minus I can think of, because on the whole, I can quantify the TJMRQCS as one of the best salads I've ever had, at least in the prepackaged variety. And naturally, because of the leafy roughage, lean protein, and grainy goodness, the salad is filling and will keep you going all day.

So...what did Sandy think? Wish I could tell you exactly. I'm almost certain she would've loved every bite of it, as the only potentially undesirable bits would be the onions that she could easily flick aside and carry on. Sandy took hers to work, and somehow, for some reason or other, forgot to eat it... *smh*...shame shame. I guess the preschool fish sticks were just too tempting for her, and since she has this fairly strict and sensible rule about never eating something past its supposed "best by" date, the window for her to try it this week has unfortunately passed. Doh. Fortunately for me, Sandy brought it back home, and since I lack such a strict and sensible rule, and hate for such things to go to complete waste, I had a bit of it with my lunch today to remind myself yet again how good it is. It was only two day's past its best-by date, and still impeccably fresh and not one bit funkified, so don't judge me, alright?

I think I've decided that TJMRQCS stands for more than just Trader Joe's Mango, Red Quinoa and Chicken Salad. It also stands for "Trader Joe's Made Russ Quite a Craziscrumptilicios Salad," because that they did. I can give it only the slightest of knocks for the dressing's consistency, and given how minor an offense that is when weighed against the whole, it seems only right that we have a new entrant into the "What's Good at Trader Joe's" Pantheon.

Bottom line: 9.5 out of 10 Golden Spoons

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Trader Joe's Tropical Carrot Juice Blend

In a previous post, it was established that I have a fear of carrot juice. I've never been a fan of the original V-8 or any other vegetable juice. I like vegetable soup, salty and served hot, but cold vegetable juice seems to violate the natural beverage laws that I've come to accept. Fruit/vegetable hybrid drinks, such as V-8 Splash, can be hit or miss with me, depending on which ingredients they throw into the mix.

I'm assuming that the juices used in making this beverage are a bunch of tropical fruits with some carrots tossed in. Judging by the name, it's either that, or they've used some mysterious, elusive "tropical carrots," which are apparently sweet, fruit-like, and delicious.

But either way, I was pleasantly surprised by the taste of this juice. To me, it doesn't taste carrot-ish at all. I find most juice blends that sneak some carrot into the mix to be moderately palatable. However, I can still taste carrot in most of them. They usually find some clever way to dress up the carrot-taste with citrus fruits, but you can still detect that hint of vegetabliness. Not so with this juice. The carrot flavor is barely detectable, and it blends beautifully with the fruit juices. It's very tasty for a carrot/fruit juice blend.

So really, this is a genre of beverages that generally scores very low in my book, but this tropical carrot juice is a really solid effort on the part of TJ's. I would buy it again. I'll give it 4 stars out of 5. Sonia, although not as vehemently opposed to vegetable juices as I am, thought it unnatural for a carrot juice blend to taste so sweet. She found the flavor a bit strange, yet not undrinkable. She gives it a 3.

Bottom line: 7 out of 10.

Thursday, June 30, 2011

Trader Joe's Bibimbap Bowl

Today, we got our Bibimbap on. Here's a link that should help you pronounce it properly. It sounds like it starts with a "p," and apparently the middle syllable is stressed.

Bibimbap is a Korean word that means simply "mixed meal." So basically, we've got rice, some sort of Korean barbeque-esque meat, some carrot-like vegetables, a bit of seaweed or kelp or kale or something, and a mysterious egg-like substance. It's quite an authentic recreation of a visit to a real Korean BBQ house. You'll recognize one or two of the items, and the rest of the foods...well, you might have some vague notion of what they could be, but unless you're dining with a bilingual Korean person, you're pretty much flying blind. You kind of just get in the habit of sticking stuff in your mouth and hoping for the best. It's kinda fun. Until you get a bite of something nasty. But then you can always go back to the meats. Korean BBQ meats are pretty universally tasty, in my opinion.

To my delight (but probably to the dismay of many others) there was no kimchi in this meal. I'm not sure which amazes me more: the fact that people actually enjoy fermented cabbage dishes, or the fact that more than one culture on our planet came up with the same idea. "Hey guys, let's throw this yucky vegetable in a barrel, let it rot for a while, and see if something yummy comes out!" Kimchi is kinda like Korean sauerkraut. It's spicier than sauerkraut, to be sure, but just as nasty.

Thankfully, the Bibimbap Bowl does feature some Korean beef. Absolutely delicious. It has an amazing tender texture and lots of flavor. Too bad there's only a couple bites of it in the bowl. In fact, that's my biggest complaint about this dish. I really wanted to give this a very high score, but I simply can't praise it as much as I would like to because of the lack of its best constituent part.

The second best part of the bowl? The sauce. It's red, spicy, and flavorful, and to me it tastes authentically Korean. I've only had Korean BBQ a handful of times in my life, but from what I remember, the best sauces are quite similar to the stuff included in Trader Joe's Bibimbap Bowl.

The other 4 ingredients are also pretty yummy, especially when coated with the aforementioned red sauce, but they're not quite as special as the beef. They're all reminiscent of things I've had in a Korean restaurant, and not one of them is gross or too strange to be eaten. I broke out some leftover chopsticks we had from our recent visit to Pei Wei. It helped to make the experience even more Asian.

In summary, my score can't be too high because of the lack of meat in the dish, but maybe that's just my typical American overenthusiasm for beef talking. I'm sure Koreans, health-conscious as they generally are, don't eat that much beef on a regular basis, but my visits to Korean BBQ spots would tell me different. Although, those restaurants I've been to are probably just catering to their "Viva-America" clientele. Conversely, I can't score this dish too low, either, since my natural inclination is to compare this Bibimbap Bowl with entrees I've had from relatively high-class Korean restaurants and homemade dishes. It didn't even occur to me to compare this to anything I've ever had from any other grocery store. And therein lies Trader Joe's genius: many of their foods, this product included, simply transcend the offerings of other grocery stores.

Let's go with a 3.5. Sonia was also annoyed by the lack of meat, but overall, she was truly impressed as well. She gives it a 4.

Bottom line: 7.5 out of 10.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Trader Joe's Omega Orange Carrot Juice

Here it is, right at the start of another month, and thus another fresh opportunity for the Pittsburgh home office of the WG@TJ's team to reassess our overall healthiness patterns and nutritional choices. Okay, it's probably not an every month kinda deal, but it's cyclical enough, and Sandy's got it on her mind, which means she's making sure it's on my mind, too. By "sure", I mean "very sure." For the whole month of June, we're going to be tracking everything we eat, estimate all our calories, focus on working out, and trying to start living our way into a more wholesome lifestyle. Or so we say, check back with us in a couple weeks. I suppose it's kind of a natural time to do so, with Sandy resuming her training for her next half-marathon after kicking some tail a couple weeks ago at the Pittsburgh half, and with me embarking on my two day, 135-mile bike ride to benefit the National MS Society* in just a few days. That and we want to be sure we're in tip-top bathing suit shape if we ever make a beach run to the pristine shorelines of Lake Erie. Or something like that.

With that in mind, Sandy and I promptly ran to Trader Joe's to find the healthiest non-swampy-looking juice we could ... Wait, that's not how that goes. Truth is, we bought the Omega Orange Carrot Juice sometime in the undetermined past, had it on the bottom shelf of the pantry for who knows how long until Sandy decided to try it a week or two ago (probably because the other drinking options were beer, milk, and water at our house), stuck it in the fridge, and I finally got my gumption sufficiently upped to give it a try because I was thirsty and the other options were milk and water.

Yeah, I'll admit it, I was a little apprehensive to give it a try. I understand what the typical run-of-the-mill sugary fruity juices are - they're delicious. Veggie juices and those that throw words like "Omega" in their name call to mind that ploppy chunky off-colored stuff produced by the Jack LaLanne Power Juicer. Please tell me how ramming through then drinking a whole cucumber gets anyone ready for a day of aimless posing around the senior center. I don't get it.

Anyways, TJ's has themselves another winner with this juice. It's not just legitimately surprisingly good, it's tasty enough to pass itself off as being unhealthy. The juice is actually a blend of four juices - carrot, orange, apple and pineapple - with the different qualites of each shining through in smooth, smooth fashion. The nose of the flavor hints at the citrusy qualities, while midway through it transitions seamlessly to a less acidic, more base-like flavor (a la apple juice) and finishes with a silky cinnamony flourish which I can only assume is the carrot segment of this tasty potion. If this sounds unusual, it's because it is - I'm never had anything that tastes quite like it. Want proof of how good this tastes? Take a look at what they sneak in - omega fish oils from sardines and anchovies, tilapia gelatin (now that's cringe-inducing). There's not one hint of it. Granted, I don't know if those fishy components are supposed to taste, well, fishy, but this particular juice easily incorporates and covers over them in a concoction so flavorsome it had me fooled, and that's not easy.

It's not just the taste that I appreciate, but also its smoothness. There's a pretty heady amount of sediment in the bottle until you shake it out, but once you do, there's no pulp or clumps or amebic blobs to gag on. It's just smooth, free-flowing, glorious juice. As for its healthiness, well, I assume it's pretty good for you based on what the label says and hearing a thing or two about omega fatty acids here and there, but really, I'm not an expert. Relative to most juices at least, I'll go ahead and say it is. Keep in mind, this is coming from the guy who on the first day of spouse-mandated food intake monitoring thought it'd be an okay idea to get a steak, egg and cheese breakfast wrap from the local convenience store. I specifically custom-ordered it from the touch screen to have them add lettuce, tomatoes, green peppers and jalapeños - that makes it kinda like a salad, right? Right? And the tortilla was whole wheat too ...

Anyways, I've been thoroughly enjoying a small cup of the juice while typing this review. Note to my wife: Sorry, dear, I forgot to pour it into a measuring cup first, but I'm being good and not gulping it down like I could very easily be tempted to, I'll track it, don't worry. Sandy's a fan of it, just not nearly as much as I am. She gave it only a three, saying she liked the cinnamony aspect to the overall flavor. I asked her what could be better, and she blinked once or twice and said "Meh." I'm not exactly sure how to interpret that. Anyways, a three is way too low in my book. I'll go ahead and give 4.5, if for no other reason than to make sure it is listed among one of TJ's "really darn good" items on this blog. Because really darn good is exactly what it is.

Bottom line: 7.5 out of 10 Golden Spoons
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* Hey, I made mention of this a while ago but didn't get much if any response but if you're interested in reading more about why I'm doing the ride, and would possibly be interested in supporting me, please check out my personal fundraising webpage. There's a lot of folks out there with MS, and I want to try and do something about it.

Friday, May 27, 2011

Trader Joe's Corn and Chile Tomato-Less Salsa

One of the best parts of writing for this blog is using it as an occasional forum to poke some light fun at my wife. Food is a pretty easy and tame avenue for me to do so. A few years ago as we were beginning our dating relationship, I remember it taking a lot of effort (and trial and error) on my part to try and learn Sandy's "food rules." Chili? No. Red meat? Except for a burger here and there, nope. Some vegetables are okay, others aren't. We kind of turned it into an ongoing joke where I said I'd need to keep a spreadsheet of what was and wasn't okay, and when. For example, squishy cooked vegetables are flat-out never acceptable. Onions are okay only sometimes, such as onion flavor, but Sandy doesn't like big chunks of them, except for onion rings. I really wanted to learn these rules so I could impress her and make sure when we were going somewhere there would be food choices she would like. I took it quite seriously, to the point where one night early on in our relationship when I was making a homemade dinner and dessert for us, I felt compelled to ask her if she liked from-scratch chocolate chip cookies because I didn't know and didn't want to make them if she didn't. As she can attest to, Sandy certainly loves them (who doesn't?) and probably wonders why I don't make them more often (the answer = like we need more cookies).

By now, I've grown so accustomed to them I rarely have to think about them much. It's kind of like natural knowledge at this point. And to her credit, I think she's opened up to more kinds of foods. But there's still one sure-fire food item that she'll refuse to have nearly any part with: tomatoes. Except for maybe a little ketch-up and just enough sauce to make her pasta noodles semi-red, Sandy wants nothing to do with them. Increasingly, salsa is getting some more leeway for her in this department, even though she's still a little wary of the chunkier varieties and prefers salsa verde, which is made from tomatillos, over the more usual salsa types.

I guess that's why Trader Jose's Corn and Chile Tomato-Less Salsa appeals to her so much. There's the huge upfront plus of no tomatoey guts being spilled for its sake. Plus, it's something different than the usual variety, though I'm not so positive about its authenticity as an actual salsa class instead of being a gringoey gimmick. Correct me if I am wrong. The only other time I've seen or heard anything about corn-based salsa is at Qdoba's or Chipotle's, and though I've never tried it there, that stuff has always appeared to me to be more spiced corn than an actual salsa. That's how the TJ's brand strikes me as well, except to say it's spiced is a little bit of an overstatement. It doesn't have the spicy pepper meter that usually overstates heat level on the jar label, and I'd like to think that was on purpose because, to me, it'd barely register a blip. There's a little heat that emanates from the back of your throat after a corner-of-a-chip-ful or three, but that's about it, and it's more than balanced out by the overall sweetness. Like any good American food product, the two chief ingredients in the salsa are corn and sugar, which makes the salsa seemingly syrupy-sweet. There's not nearly enough jalapeños and spices to combat it with any sort of effectiveness. It's kinda like flinging rubberbands at a tank - not gonna work. One good thing the salsa has going for it is, it's decently fresh tasting as the corn kernels taste like they were just stripped from the cob, and certainly not mushy but good and firm, almost crunchy in a way.

Anyways, Sandy loves it. Last night, as I came downstairs after a post-work/pre-dinner shower, I could hear her rustling our bag of soy and flaxseed chips shut followed shortly by the sound of a jar lid being screwed back on. I got to the kitchen just in time to see her one step away from our fridge, half-gone jar of salsa in hand, with a very guilty look on her face. This is an extremely common scenario in our house, except with the roles reversed. Granted, we poked at it some the night before, but she did some serious work on it while I was washing away the day at work. "It's just so good, I could eat it by the spoonful," she said. "Apparently," I said as I shook my head and tsk-tsked her. I couldn't be too mad not only because I've been the guilty party in this situation way too often and therefore thought grace would be the wisest route to go, but also because honestly I don't like nearly as much as she does. I'm going to have to go low and give it a 1.5. Sorry, while it's a good premise and has potential, it just doesn't have enough spice to hold my interest, and it's way too sugary-sweet for me to even try to pretend it's a mild, enjoyable salsa for me. While she agreed it needed to be spicier, Sandy was so joyful about finding a salsa she liked without tomatoes, she literally broke out into song as she scaled our stairs to turn herself in for the night with a good book. "It has no tomatoes, it has no tomatoes, that makes me happpppyyyyy, it has no tomatoes," she sang to our beloved little fur baby as he no doubt shot back a quizzical look. Sandy toyed with giving it a perfect five before settling on a 4.5, tripling(!!!) my score. Usually we agree more or less on our rankings, so this type of split is definitely unprecedented and hard to repeat. Sandy's probably happy though, because since I don't like it so much, it means more for her.

Enjoy the rest of the jar, dear. All yours.

Bottom line: 6 out 10 Golden Spoons

Monday, August 16, 2010

Trader Joe's No-Tomato Chicken Lasagna with Spinach & Roasted Garlic Bechamel Sauce

I hate to start this blog off with a negative review, but as fate should have it, I ate this Trader Joe's Chicken Lasagna today for lunch and was not impressed. Sonia tried the same lasagna last week and warned me that it was quite bland. She didn't even finish hers, which is not like her at all. She's not one to waste food, simply on principle. There are starving children in Africa.

Anyway, this lasagna is virtually devoid of flavor. It boasts "No-Tomato" on the label. Well, friends, if God didn't want lasagna to have tomato, he would have banished the enigmatic fruit/vegetable from the nation of Italy back when the usually-delicious pasta dish was being developed some centuries ago. But of course vine-ripened tomatoes thrive in the lush gardens of Mediterranean countries, and are, therefore, an essential ingredient in many Italian dishes.

I found myself pining for the taste of tangy tomato sauce so greatly, that I raided our miscellaneous drawer for some leftover hot sauce and salsa packets from various fast food restaurants. After adding them, I found the flavor much improved, and was able to finish the dish. Now, in the lasagna's defense, I did prepare mine in the microwave, not in the oven. The label does say microwaving is a viable option, however we all know things generally come out better when cooked in the oven.

I'll be honest...I don't know what Bechamel sauce is. It is apparently green, mushy, and flavorless, save for a hint of garlic. Furthermore, I could detect neither the taste nor the texture of chicken in this so called "Chicken Lasagna." If there was chicken in the food, it was evidently pureed beyond recognition, and somehow sapped of all indigenous flavor.

I will say the lasagna feels pretty light...my stomach is not in agony, nor do I have any weird aftertaste haunting me, reminding me of the experience...I do not remember the price of the item. Somewhere in the ballpark of $3, I believe. With all of the delicious items TJ's has to offer, I do not recommend trying this one unless you're really desperate for something new. Two out of Five Stars from Nathan...One out of Five Stars from Sonia. Bottom line: 3 out of 10.