Trader Joe's Tamarind Sauce

Not all that long ago, the beautiful wifey made a comment about craving tamarind sauce with another Trader Joe's product we reviewed. The comment struck me as totally random at the time, but at least part of my reaction was due to my general disdain for tamarind-flavored things.

I've had tamarind candy, tamarind soda, and even tamarind-flavored vodka. In each case, I thought it was kinda gross. Sonia grew up with such treats...well, okay, not the vodka, but the tamarind candy and beverages are something she's totally accustomed to. I think it's a Mexican thing.

To me, this sauce isn't a far cry from steak sauce, flavor-wise, but perhaps a bit more versatile. It's a bit thinner than A1 and other leading brands and perhaps a tad sweeter, but both types of sauces are tart, tangy, citrusy, and have an interesting blend of peppery spices underneath it all. This tamarind sauce is almost like a slightly fruitier version of Worcestershire sauce.

I don't think the average American wants A1-flavored candy or steak sauce soda, do you? But in its proper context as a condiment for meat, it's perfectly tasty. I'd say the same for tamarind, personally.

This sauce worked well with salmon, providing the same sort of sweet-tart element you might get from teriyaki sauce. It also went great with grilled chicken. I'm sure it would work well with white fish or shrimp. I don't eat steak very often, but I'd absolutely use it in place of A1 or Worcestershire.

It pours a deep, dark brown—almost like used motor oil. But because it's so relatively thin, it doesn't coat very well, and you can go through a lot of it quite quickly. I think it was $2.99 for about 7 oz.

We're both down for another purchase. Four stars from me. Four and a half from Sonia.

Bottom line: 8.5 out of 10.

Trader Joe's Crispy Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies

 

In the world of cookies, there's a few ways you can go, of course. 

There's soft and squishy/melty. Soft and crumbly. Crispy and crumbly. Crispy and crunchy. hard and crunchy. And then just plain ol' rocks. 

For my money, as that list progresses, the quality and enjoyment factor of a peanut butter cookie goes down significantly...but we may have a new benchmark with Trader Joe's Crispy Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies. 

Usually, it's the taste that diminishes the further right on the spectrum you go. But, it's not the case here. there's an undeniably strong peanut butter flavor, albeit somewhat sweet and sugary. it's a cookie, after all. But the taste is fairly nutty, a touch savory, and hits a lot of key notes, and is enough of a winning combo for my book. The little occasional chunk of peanut does help seal the deal.

But man, these would be even better if softer in my opinion, to really let that flavor wash over. Instead, the bite-sized cookies border on being too hard, too crunchy at times. The molars do get a work out here. A little milk or hot chocolate does soften them, for sure, but it'd be nice to have a softer bite without resorting to dunking. 

These new TJ pb cookies are pretty tasty, and a tub is worth a pick up for the occasional munch or homework time motivator. At about $4 for the tub it's a good enough value even for not being my preferred texture. There's only so many ways you can go.

Bottom line: Trader Joe's Crispy Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies: 7 out of 10 Golden Spoons

Trader Joe's Cinna-Dragons

The age of the dragon is upon us.

So many pop culture dragons these days I could blather on about: Smaug from The Hobbit, Daenerys Targaryen's dragons from Game of Thrones, Toothless from How to Train Your Dragon. I could go on and on.

Why these little candies are shaped like dragons and not like, I dunno...bears or tigers or something...anything else, I really have no idea. They're not even all that hot. The bag even states, "Are they fire-breathing dragon hot? Nah."

That's accurate.

The heat level here is probably just enough to annoy spice-o-phobes and probably a good bit shy of what a spice-o-phile is craving. But if you just want a standard sweet cinnamon candy with a bit of a kick, then these little treats are hard to complain about.

I went through a brief Hot Tamales phase in high school. These are comparable. I liked Fireballs, too, which obviously weren't chewy, but flaunted a very similar sweet-hot cinnamon flavor profile.

I don't recall what ingredients were used in those old-school cinnamon candies, but the Trader Joe's version is pretty much above reproach in that department. There's cane sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup and vegetable juice instead of weird chemical dyes. Nothing super unusual or unpronounceable.

In the end, I just have to be in the mood for cinnamon candy. There's nothing about these that calls me back for piece after piece. Their texture is fine. Their flavor is fine. I don't know what I was expecting. Maybe TJ's should dip them in dark chocolate next time.

Beautiful wifey feels the same. $2.29 per resealable bag. Gluten-free. Kosher. Three stars a piece from Sonia and me for Trader Joe's Cinna-Dragons.

Bottom line: 6 out of 10.

Trader Joe's Deli Style Corned Beef Flavor Dog Treats

Well this product is seasonally-appropriate, at least. Along with potatoes, Irish bangers, Irish soda bread, and of course Lucky Charms cereal, corned beef is a classic St. Patrick's Day meal. And since we've never seen any actual corned beef products for people from Trader Joe's, it looks like these dog treats are on deck for a review.

Even the packaging is green, white, and orange. How festive. And although there are no shamrocks or overt mentions of the patron saint of Ireland, we know what Trader Joe's was going for. The spiel on the back of the bag even suggests making a reuben sandwich for dogs using these corned beef treats.

Let's check out the ingredients. They include beef, potato, paprika, and celery powder. Heck with ingredients like that, I'd consider eating them. With grocery prices these days, I may have to...

But my dogs would have something to say about that, because they love these treats. There's a good bit of protein and fat, and of course no grains. If you stick your nose in the bag, it really does smell like real corned beef. As far as dog snacks go, these are pretty top-notch, quality-wise. And they're top-notch taste-wise, too, if I go by my mutts' reaction when I break this bag out of the pet pantry.

No dog deli near you? No problem. These are authentic deli style dog treats. Alfred and Sadie both agree. Four paw prints a piece.

Bottom line: 8 out of 10.

Trader Joe's Camembert Cheese and Cranberry Sauce Fillo Bites

Oh boy! Here's an ostensibly brand new product for March 2022. I think it's supposed to be a St. Patrick's Day hor d'oeuvre or maybe a meat-free Friday Lent snack, right? It's definitely not like we found it at the back of our freezer that we were in the process of clearing out since spring cleaning is right around the corner.

I'm sure it's not been sitting there for months, like it was intended as a Thanksgiving side or Christmas appetizer or Valentine's Day treat...unless maybe it was. Fact-checkers, feel free to disregard all assertions made in these first two paragraphs of this review. Or feel free to fact-check us and cause some controversy. No such thing as bad publicity and all that.

The point is that this product probably isn't brand new, or even in season, or even available at Trader Joe's right now. In fact, a quick "Search This Blog" inquiry would suggest that it was available at Trader Joe's stores in November/December 2015.

If that upsets you, please bookmark this review and return circa late November or December 2022 when these thoughts may or may not be more relevant than they seem to be right now.

Just FYI, the "best by" date on these was April 2023, so it's not like it's been in our freezer for centuries. We're still preparing the product more than a year before it expires, so freshness shouldn't be an issue. However, the Camembert cheese might be. I'm just sensitive to all mold cheeses like Brie, Roquefort, and Stilton. But I'll taste just about anything once. So I did. And all I could taste was mold. So I decided to let Sonia score these all on her own.

She loved the phyllo dough. It was nice and crispy and flaky like it usually is with similar Trader Joe's appetizers. The sweet and tart cranberry sauce was a nice touch, but it could have been more prevalent. She doesn't think there was enough of it to offset the bitterness of the Camembert.

In the end, I guess she's not really a mold cheese gal, either. She wanted to like these crispy, cheesy little apps, but they're not really her thing. Some bites had a "chewiness" that turned her off, in addition to the grassy, planty flavor that she detected. We both wanted these to be dessert-like, but the prevalent flavor was that of a cheese that's apparently just too sophisticated for either of our palates. At a quick glance, there are plenty of dissenting opinions out there in cyberspace, but this probably isn't a repeat purchase for Sonia and me.

Bottom line: 6 out of 10.

Trader Joe's French Chocolate Crepe Wafer Cookies

Yeah, it's the first day of Lent, and some of you may be giving up chocolate as is tradition, and perhaps you didn't really want or need to see a review on the new Trader Joe's French Chocolate Crepe Wafer Cookies...

Yet here we are. 

Be assured, though, you're not missing much. These newbies are one of the great examples of "nothing really wrong, but nothing really right either" niche that TJ's occasionally stumbles on. 

Like, I'm not going to complain about thin carmelized wafer dough, rolled up and dipped in some tasty milk chocolate. That'd be ridiculous, because it's tasty. Of course it's tasty.

But is there anything compelling here at all? Anything for a little added kick, or something that'd help seal the deal for a definite rebuy. Nah, not at all. A little sea salt, or a touch of French vanilla, or some cafe au lait, or, I don't know, some  baguettes or something would make it a much more compelling product. It might also help point out exactly what's so "French" about these. 

Instead it's just a nice little crispy, airy, chocolate treat. Nothing wrong, but nothing overwhelmingly right. And sorry but I just can't get a great pic of the nutritional info and ingredients, it's just too small for my potato, I mean phone. 

Meh. 

Bottom line: Trader Joe's French Chocolate Crepe Wafer Cookies: 5.5 out of 10 Golden Spoons.

Trader Joe's Beer Bread Mix

Ah, beer, bread, and butter. That's a winning triple B combo right there. Each of the three is pretty delish on its own. Combined? Even better. Throw in some shredded cheese—yes this product calls for shredded cheese as an optional ingredient—and those are four pretty spectacular food elements. 

All together, will they become even greater than the sum of their parts, a la Voltron? I know I'm dating myself with that reference. I'd have said Avengers or something more contemporary, but they never physically combine into one giant superhero. Man, I miss the 80's.

Unfortunately, three of the four ingredients aren't supplied by Trader Joe's in this box. It's just the mix. But most people have some kind of butter or butter substitute in the kitchen. 

Not a drinker? No beer on hand? No problem. You can substitute with any carbonated beverage. Coke or Pepsi? Hmmm. I wouldn't chance it, personally. But I think seltzer water might be even weirder. Red Bull or Rockstar? Please try it and report back here. The wife wouldn't let me turn this loaf of bread mix into an energy drink experiment.

So we used Tiramisu Pastry Stout—also from Trader Joe's, but not Trader Joe's brand. It's a dark beer. Fairly desserty. Way better than the Chocolate Babka Stout by my reckoning, but still not something I'd seek out regularly. As mentioned above, the shredded cheese is optional, but we used a blend that included jack, cheddar, and colby.

We wound up having ours in the oven at 350° for about an hour by the time it was all said and done. The bread came out with a big poofy top. The "head" of the bread was crusty and crispy. The insides ranged from absolutely perfect to just a little undercooked, texture-wise.

The flavor was surprisingly good straight out of the oven. It's hard to put my finger on just what it reminded us of, but we were both thinking of that complementary bread from Outback Steakhouse for some reason. 

It also reminded me a little bit of banana bread, but without bananas obviously, and maybe a little less sweet. Honestly, pretty darn yummy. Paired well with a thin spread of butter.

I'm curious what the results would be if you used a different beverage or different kind of cheese. I feel like this would be another product entirely if you used cheap beer and left out the shredded cheddar combo. 

$2.99 for the mix. It yields 16 servings of bread. Three and a half stars a piece from Sonia and me.

Bottom line: 7 out of 10.

Trader Joe's Shredded Pizza Seasoned Toscano Cheese

It's Friday and that means only one thing in our house: it's jammie movie pizza night! My lovely bride and our *coughcough* charming little rascals look forward to it every week...especially the pizza. Say what you will about the last twoish years, but one of the upshots is that we've really perfected the craft of homemade pizza, and are continuing to branch out...I can't wait til it's warm enough to fire up the OOni we bought ourselves for Christmas!

So yeah we love pizza here, love making it...and maybe that's the problem we have with Trader Joe's Shredded Pizza Seasoned Toscano Cheese. 

Perhaps it's silly me. I bought this on a whim on a pizza supply procurement run. I figured it'd be great atop a pizza. That's...not really the case. This cheese just doesn't melt as well as a good mozzarella. And unlike mozzarella, which adds a little of its own mildness that absorbs and incorporates spice and taste and zing from other elements of the pizza, this cheese tries to do it all by itself. It's seasoned to be a pizza, not to be for a pizza, at least to me. The garlic gets too roasty sweet and the rest of the spice blend is a tick or two off from what I prefer.

That and there's this odd tang that toscano has that I forgot that I'm always on the fence of enjoying. 

Probably if sprinkled in a salad or atop a baked potato or into some scrambled eggs I'd enjoy it a bit more. Undeniably, the toscano is going for a pizzaesque vibe, and it does taste at least somewhat like a decent pizza all by itself, and if more things could taste like pizza, well...I don't know. Maybe it's one of those "it's decent but not for us" kinda deals, especially for making pizza so we can season it as we wish, not how this cheese imposes, if you follow. 

I'll go nice and say it's not bad. If it dig it, by all means enjoy, maybe in your jammies while watching Encanto for the 17th time tonight like we just might be.

Bottom line: Trader Joe's Shredded Pizza Seasoned Toscano Cheese: 6 out of 10 Golden Spoons

Trader Joe's Dressed Up Mango

It's been a while since we've seen a new mango product from Trader Joe's. That used to be one of their staples. Did I mention Trader Joe's likes to take previously-existing products and dip them in dark chocolate? We've even seen mango and dark chocolate at least once before, but that one had coconut, too. So if it was coconut that steered you away from that old-school TJ's treat, you're in luck.

This product is nothing but thin slices of real dried mango with one end dipped in dark chocolate. There's just enough thickness and body to the mango slices that they're still a little syrupy on the inside. They're nice and sweet and fruity like you'd expect.

I kinda like that they only dipped one end in chocolate. The whole thing in chocolate would be overkill. It would also be way more messy that way.

I've had dried mango before, and the quality here is pretty top-notch compared to the other offerings I've sampled. The dark chocolate is nothing to shake a stick at, either.

And of course, we have to mention the tin. The square tin this product comes in is obviously something you can keep and use to store bubblegum cards, jewelry, cigars, ammunition, prophylactics, jerky, silver coins, iodine pills, or pretty much anything that might come in handy for the imminent SHTF situation. 

Or you can repurpose it as a gift box. It's pretty solid metal and feels durable—built to stand the test of time, you know? It's $7.49, so it's on the more expensive end of the dried fruit spectrum, but there's that sexy tin, though... 

Four stars from the beautiful wifey. Three and a half stars from this guy.

Bottom line: 7.5 out of 10.