I've had a few lava cakes in restaurants, and have loved them. I was alerted to the fact that TJ's sold their own version by this enthusiastic review at the "Eat at Joe's" blog, and eagerly bought a box on my next shopping trip.
My experience, however, was markedly different from his. They are as chocolaty as the EAJ blog promises. But I just didn't much care for them. The chocolate tasted generic, commercial, mass-produced. The whole thing reminded me of a microwaved Hostess Ding Dong with a squirt of Hershey's syrup in the middle.
I could not bring myself to use words like "delicate" or "creamy," as the box does, nor "rich and intense," as EAJ does. The words that spring to my mind are more like "adequate," "tolerable," and "disappointing." I have no cogent explanation for why I found them so much less rewarding than EAJ did.
Will I buy it again?
No.
I agree! I was very disappointed in TJ's lava cake and could not understand how or why everybody else loved them. I usually make them from scratch and will go back to making my own. To be fair, this is the first item I have tried from Trader Joe's that I did not like and would never buy again.
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