Trader Joe's Mahi Mahi

It's taken me a while to get around to the idea of enjoying fish as a food source. I've always liked shrimp and crab legs and other crustaceany goods but fish, like an actual chunk of fish? Not so much. Growing up, it was easy to tell when all of us kids (I have two brothers and one sister) yanked my mom's chain just a little too much. That meant it was haddock for dinner, drenched in lemon juice and butter, and coated with breadcrumbs before being oven baked. Maybe that sounds good to you, but to us, I would rather eat yard clippings. Our only other exposure to fish in my youth was the chunky tuna from a can, from which my mom made tuna fish casserole (and later, began trying to sneak in homemade mac 'n cheese. That should be illegal). To my mom, who's probably reading this, you made so many other great meals growing up that I'm not going to hold it against you. I'm just providing some context for my readers. I meant it when I said you're the bestest cook in the whole world, and for more reasons than for you microwaving me a bowl of Smurf pasta when I was four.

Anyways, deepfry anything and it tastes better, right? That's what got me sorta hooked* on fish. During Lent, Sandy and I make a point of hitting up as many fish frys as possible at the local Catholic churches (best. fish. ever). There's lots of other great places to go in Pittsburgh for a good fish sandwich**, as it seems like an unofficially second official sandwich of the city behind Primanti Bros (don't knock 'em unless you tried 'em).

But, of course, that's not the only way to enjoy the meat that swims. In anticipation of our upcoming southern California vacation, and also because we're intent on using our new favorite cookbook for at least four or five dinners a week, we decided to make ourselves some fish tacos a few nights ago, and so needed to procure ourselves a hunk of tasty gilled goodness. With that, we perused the frozen section at Trader Joe's and ended up scoring us a big ol' piece of Mahi Mahi. Was it victorious?

I'd say so. The fish quickly defrosts and I was easily able to slice it up into smaller bits and pieces to get them coated with chili powder and other spices (see, I like a lot of things coated with chili, not just everything. Can we agree to disagree?) and quickly cook on the stove top in just a little bit of oil. With some tortillas, fresh greens from our garden, and some lime-infused yogurt/other stuff sauce, both Sandy and I were nomming in agreement: this was a really good incarnation of some rather tasty fish. The Mahi Mahi had big, light, fishy flakes and kept just moist enough throughout the whole process from package to belly. And tastewise, honestly, it wasn't overly fishy at all. Aside from texture, I almost would have guessed it was chicken. Despite being frozen, it struck me as being fairly fresh, certainly not right off the boat, but fresh enough for a grocery store purchase.

Definitely good. Sandy and I agree that we're going to have to get it again and try out some different recipes with it. The package claims you can grill it right from its frozen state and it'll end up just fine, so I want to see if I can vouch for that or not. And for $6.99 a pound, it's not an exorbitant expenditure, either.

We're both giving it a four for its taste and overall goodness. This is definitely the best fish I've ever bought at a grocery store. Not that I have a lot of other similar purchases to compare it against, but I've had fresh fish bought at the seafood counter at other stores and this seems to be very close in overall quality, which for something frozen says something. We'd recommend picking it up, no doubt.

Bottom line: 8 out of 10 Golden Spoons

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* As opposed to definitely hooked, which was my right index finger when I went fishing when I was five. Maybe that's another reason that it took me a while to warm up to fish.
** i.e., not a Filet-O-Fish. Barffffff.

Trader Joe's Potato Pancakes

I love lazy weekend mornings at home, and when given the opportunity, I'll definitely take advantage. Take this past Sunday for example. I slept 'til I was done, got out of bed a little bit after that, meandered downstairs to get caught up on the news, and waited for my lovely wife to come home from her early morning 8-mile run through zillion percent humidity (she's training for her next half-marathon in a month and halfish, crazy chick) before she tackled finishing up end-of-program-year summary reports for a swath of her preschool kids. Okay, it was a lazy weekend morning for one of us*, at least, and I'm relieved she wasn't too mad that I missed her text message to have coffee ready for her when she came home. Needless to say, it was up to me to make us some breakfast, which is one of the things I love to do the most, especially with a little Jack Johnson or The Head and the Heart for a soundtrack for a pretty laid back morning.

Sandy specifically requested some Trader Joe's Potato Pancakes to go alongside her scrambled eggs and coffee. Truth be told, we bought these I'm not sure how long ago and had them buried somewhere in the freezer. I'm pretty glad I didn't have to chisel them out. I'm not sure if I remembered we had them, but I'm thankful she did.

Potato pancakes, or latkes, are a very simple, straightforward dish. Some potato (some mashed, some smaller bits), a little matzah meal, a wee bit of onion, salt and pepper, fry them up in a little oil (technically you can bake them too, but that seems a little silly). And that's exactly what these TJ's latkes are. The term "frozen prepared foods" brings to mind the thought of being preservative and sodium laden bad-for-you junk that doesn't taste all that good. In this incarnation, that could not be further from the truth. As far as I can tell, the only thing on the ingredient list that your grandma maybe wouldn't put in her famous homemade ones is dehydrated potatoes. No tetrahyglycerides or pantoglompooperamides or other made up words. As far as sodium...yeah, okay, they have a fair amount, but no more than any other potato pancake.

And in short, delicious. The onions add a lot of flavor without being overbearing, as does the salt and pepper. Outside, they crisped up well when fried but inside the pancakes were of the right semi-mashed texture. These latkes are pretty well sized, too, I'd say a good three bites or so each, so there's plenty to enjoy, and made the two-and-a-half we had each (somehow we had five of them left from a box of eight) more than enough to go along with our eggs. If we had some good applesauce I would have been pretty tempted to make that pairing a go, but alas we did not. I'm not huge on heaping some sour cream on them, but I know that's pretty popular, and that would make a delicious treat for those who are into that. Even though we enjoyed them with breakfast, TJ's potato pancakes seem versatile enough to serve with any meal, and quick 'n easy enough to scarf down as a snack as well.

I think I'd put them right on par with ones I've had out at places like Eat 'n Park (if you're not familiar with them, think Denny's except much better), so they're good in my book. I'll bestow upon them a four and a half. As for Sandy, she definitely enjoyed them as well, but said she's had some better ones that were homemade from some of the Eastern European and Jewish families at her school. Yeah, no doubt those would be better. Also, as I tend to do when juggling a few different dishes at once, I accidentally semi-blackened one side of them, which didn't do them too much injustice except Sandy mentioned that she would have them enjoyed them a little bit more if I didn't. "That's not Trader Joe's fault, though; that's Russ Shelly's fault," she said. Well, at least I made your eggs perfectly and exactly to order, Princess. Sandy settled on meting out a good solid four.

Bottom line: 8.5 out of 10
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*Lazy weekend mornings for one is alright enough, but for two is even better.