Trader Joe's Rice Pudding

I had never had rice pudding before, so I don't know how this compares to others. But I found it to be basically sweetened, thickened milk with lumps of mushy rice, and I couldn't understand why anybody would want to eat it.

Am I missing something? Is this what's it's mean to be? Is all rice pudding like this? I'm left wondering these things.


Will I buy it again? 

No.

Trader Joe's Cultivated Wild Rice

Here's an oxymoron with which to start your Friday: Cultivated wild rice.



via GIPHY


I gather that "wild" rice doesn't actually mean "found growing spontaneously in nature" as one might think, but a group of four species--whether actually wild or cultivated--in different genera than standard rice. See Wikipedia here and here.

This stuff is a bear to cook. I was about to throw it in my rice cooker, unaware that wild rice needs much more cook time than regular rice. Nina stopped me before I found out the hard way. I looked at the directions on the back of the bag, and aborted the plan, instead opting for the regular rice that evening. Before Nina's next weekly dinner here, I did as the package suggests, and put some of the wild rice in a bowl to soak overnight.

Even after that, I kept the rice boiling for nearly 15 minutes longer than the directions suggest, because as I was sampling it, it never seemed done. I ended up keeping it on the stove until all the water had boiled off--and it still wasn't really done, even though it had some burst kernels, which this page says is an indicator that it has cooked enough. Though the process was long and frustrating, it does produce a lovely aroma that makes the kitchen smell great.

So we ate not-quite-cooked-enough rice last night, topped with some of TJ's excellent Chicken-Less Orange Mandarin Morsels. The flavor matches the adjectives that seem to be universal in describing wild rice: nutty and earthy.


Will I buy it again? 

Very unlikely, unless at some point I am determined to make a special recipe that absolutely, positively must use wild rice instead of standard rice. I don't really see that happening, but ya never know. Otherwise, it's just too much bother. Plus it's way too expensive; this little bag cost $5.49!

When I feel like something a little different from plain white or brown rice, I would instead choose this or this or this.

I took the other roughly half of the bag back to the store for a refund.

Trader Joe's Organic Brown Rice Penne Pasta

This is the latest in a long line of Trader Joe's gluten-free dry pasta varieties. (For a list of the others, see here.) It is closest to the TJ's Organic Brown Rice Pasta Fusilli, apparently differing only in shape.

Like most of the others, it's less satisfying than traditional wheat-based pasta (Nina called it "gloppy"), but if one needs to live a gluten-free life, it makes an adequate substitute.


Will I buy it again? 

No.

Trader Joe's Organic Yellow Lentil & Brown Rice Pasta--Spaghetti

This is Trader Joe's latest attempt at a gluten-free pasta; see the company's introduction to the product here. The others have included Organic Brown Rice Pasta Fusilli, Organic Brown Rice & Quinoa Pasta, Organic Black Bean Rotini, Gluten Free Egg Fettuccine Pasta, and Organic Red Lentil Sedanini. I thought the last two of that list were the most successful. This one joins them in being a passable substitute for real pasta.

The color isn't a giveaway, as it resembles whole-wheat pasta. The texture was a little stiffer than regular spaghetti, but not a dealbreaker. (Nina would beg to differ. She found it both gummy and gritty.) I thought it had just a faint lentil flavor, but it's basically a bland, neutral canvas on which to place your favorite protein and sauce.


Will I buy it again? 

No. But it's another decent option for those who need or want to live gluten-free.

Trader Joe's Asparagus Risotto

The big win here is that I did not hate it, as I do most things containing asparagus. In fact, I found it rather pleasant in both flavor and texture. And it takes no work at all to prepare--freezer to microwave to table in mere minutes.


Will I buy it again? 

Probably not for myself, simply because I get plenty of rice already without it. But it would be among my choices for dinner guests. What's more, Nina liked it even more than I did, and I hereby give her permission to serve it when it's her turn to make dinner, without worrying that I will reject it.

Trader Joe's Brown Rice Medley

This is an unusual mix of brown rice, black barley, and something I had never heard of before: daikon radish seeds.

The non-rice components apparently make it slower to cook than plain rice, as you can infer from the cooking directions seen above. I still wanted to use my rice cooker, so I improvised by using about 50% more water than prescribed for plain rice. That worked well enough.

The result is really nice, with a pleasing mix of colors, flavors, and textures. It feels much fancier than plain brown rice.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes. Plain rice is fine (and cheaper) for everyday use, but I think this will be a first choice when I want to make something a little more interesting and elegant for dinner guests.

Trader Joe's Mango & Sticky Rice Spring Rolls

The "mango" part of these rolls is kind of deceptive; there's very little mango, so little that I could barely taste it.

The overwhelming sensation is of sweetness--so much that it was kind of a turn-off.


Will I buy it again? 

No.

Trader Joe's Japanese Style Fried Rice With Edamame, Tofu And Hijiki Seaweed

Well, this is unlike anything I've eaten before. I've never knowingly had anything with seaweed in it, and my experiences with tofu can be counted on one hand. The third accent ingredient, edamame, was completely unknown to me until I started writing this blog, though I now eat it regularly in TJ's Soycutash, which is one of my favorite frozen veggies combos.

I'm not in love with the combination, but I didn't object to it nearly as much as I might have. Nina and I ate about half the bag as part of dinner, and I finished the rest with lunches over the next two days. There's a whole bunch of different flavors going on here, and since some of them are outside my little zone of familiarity--soy sauce, rice wine--I don't know how to unpack or analyze them.


Will I buy it again? 

Probably not, but Nina liked it, so I won't be surprised if I encounter it again at her house--and that will be OK.

Trader Joe's Sprouted Organic California Rice

Sprouted rice has more amino acids than regular rice, and cooks up faster, too--or so claims Trader Joe's. I'm a bit dubious of the first claim: where do those amino acids come from, when the "sprouting" appears to be such a small amount that there is no shoot or root extended into soil?

I also can't verify the second claim. I usually follow cooking directions as precisely as I can when testing an item for the first time. I didn't do that here; I just dumped the stuff in my rice cooker as I would with any other rice. The machine doesn't know what kind of rice is in it, and just cooks until the pre-set amount of water has boiled off.

It turned out fine. It maybe could have used a little more cook time, as it was definitely al dente rather than truly soft. But neither Nina nor I minded the texture. It was definitely chewier and denser than plain white rice, or even plain brown rice. Nothing wrong with that.

It also has a more distinct flavor--more nutty and grainy. But I can't say that I liked it more than other kinds of rice. Different, but not better.


Will I buy it again? 

Probably not. At $2.99 for one pound, it's quite a bit more expensive than other rice, and I don't see enough advantage to pay that much extra. For comparison, TJ's has provided this handy guide to its rice varieties and their respective prices.

Nina's View

I liked this a lot. The chewiness and nuttiness were appealing. I like the color variation. It would work very nicely in a cold summer salad, maybe with beans and lentils and bell peppers and other goodies.

Try it.

Trader Joe's Dolmas

I saw a photo of one of these cans on Twitter months ago and thought, "Leaves stuffed with rice? What has crazy Trader Joe's gone and done now?" I bought a can on my next trip. (They weren't easy to find in the store, though--must not be a big seller.)

I subsequently learned that dolmas are not a Trader Joe's thing, they're just a thing. Amazingly enough, it turns out, there are foods that everybody knows about except me. This is one of them.

They sat in my cupboard for months, victim of a syndrome with which I am commonly afflicted: I work up enough food adventurism to buy some odd thing, but not enough to actually eat it. Every time I thought the dolmas might be a nice side dish for one of my weekly dinners with Nina, I would think of something that would be even better, and let them sit for another week. (Even so, we were still a year from their expiration date when they were finally consumed.)

But finally I was trying a new recipe for chili, from a new cookbook, and decided that as long as I was going out on a limb, I might as well make the whole meal a risky experiment by adding dolmas to the menu. I looked around on line, trying to figure out whether to serve them chilled, room temperature (which is what the can recommends), or heated. I went with room temperature.

In the can, they are bathed in soy oil--not the olive oil you might expect. They need some serious degreasing with paper towels.

By far the strongest part of both the smell and taste was the dill. (Fortunately, it was strong enough to completely disguise the onion.) Overall, the eating experience was kind of weird, in terms of both taste and texture, but not gag-me unpleasant.

Each of the next two days, I ate a few of them with my lunch of leftover chili and salad, so I basically had the same meal three times in a row. I found that I liked them better cold. Maybe because the texture was a little firmer and they held together better that way? Maybe because the flavors are somewhat attenuated by the cold? I don't know.

But the point is that I ate them all, except for the couple that Nina had. This is another small personal achievement in food exploration for me. Where's my participation trophy?

As for the TJ's product, of course I have no prior experience with which to compare them. To the extent that there is a consensus opinion about TJ's dolmas in online chat groups, it seems to be approximately this: (1) TJ's used to sell, at least in its California stores, house-made dolmas, which were to die for, and which would literally get purchased the minute they were put out. (2) The canned variety, by contrast, were not worth bothering with. (3) However, if you must degrade yourself with canned dolmas, they may be about as good as you can buy.


Will I buy it again? 

No. It was a successful experiment personally in that I didn't die, didn't gag, and even finished them off. But they fell short of being something I want more of in my life.

Nina's View

I know stuffed grape leaves as dolmades. When they are good, they are divine—tender leaves, moist and succulent rice, savory herbs and spices. Toothsome. Delicious!

When they're not good, they pretty atrocious. Tough, veiny leaves. Gummy rice. Single note seasoning. Stale.

For what it's worth, these are not the worst dolmades I've ever had. At least the leaves were tender. But the rest? An extreme lack of freshness and un-nuanced seasoning made them unpalatable. One day, I hope Bob will have the pleasure of really good stuffed grape leaves. Until then, we can leave these on the shelf.

Trader Joe's Brown Jasmine Rice From Thailand

See Trader Joe's guide to its various rices here.

I think this is my favorite TJ's rice yet. It's flavorful, pleasantly firm to chew, long-grained, cooks up easily and consistently, never sticky, leaving little residue lining my rice cooker.

The main thing wrong with it is the damnable package, with the resealable opening partway down the front of the bag instead of at the top, where nature intended it to be. This maddening design is enough to make me believe in demonic spirits, because who else could have thought it a good idea? It's impossible to pour out rice without spilling.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes. After I try another two or three varieties for blogging purposes, I think this is likely to become my default choice.

Nina's View

In general, I am not a fan of brown rice. I am well aware of all the arguments in its favor. And yet, I still prefer their paler pals.

Having bared my prejudice to the world, I will nevertheless aver that this is BY FAR my favorite brown rice. It is flavorful, has a nice toothsome texture, and is neither gummy nor heavy. It's good stuff.

Trader Joe's Black Rice

The official Trader Joe's guide to its rices lists 18 of them, but not this one, for reasons that are beyond my ken. Maybe it's being discontinued or something.

I hope not, because it's quite good. It's dense, hearty, substantial, chewy. When cooked, it's actually more a dark purple than black. I don't think I like it better than more ordinary rice varieties, but it's a nice change of pace. If for no other reason, you might want to buy some to use to liven up the color of an otherwise drab-looking dinner.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes.

Nina's View

I am a fan of this black rice. It is beautiful, it has a lovely toothsome texture, and the flavor is distinctive but not in any way oppressive. I must remember to pick some up on my next TJ's run.

Trader Joe's Organic Brown Rice Pasta Fusilli

The first time I ever heard of fusilli pasta was in an episode of Seinfeld:





This means that I can't hear about fusilli without thinking (1) that's it's silly, and (2) of the unfortunate place that Fusilli Jerry ended up at the conclusion of that episode. "Million to one shot, Doc. Million to one shot."

But that aside, how is this particular form of fusilli? Not as good as regular wheat pasta, but not as bad as you might expect brown-rice pasta to be. Put some good sauce and your favorite crumbly protein source on it, and you probably won't even notice that it's anything out of the ordinary. Were one to need to live gluten-free, this is one substitution that could be made quite painlessly.


Will I buy it again? 

I doubt it. Regular pastas are cheaper, tastier, and have a wider margin of error for proper cooking.

Trader Joe's Jasmine Rice From Thailand

It has taken me months to work through this three-pound bag of rice. I just cooked up the last of it tonight.

It's perfectly fine. No complaints. But if there's any special about it, it escapes me. Perhaps I'm just not enough of a rice connoisseur, but I'm not sure I can tell this from any other white rice. Maybe a little less prone to stickiness?


Will I buy it again? 

TJ's has lots and lots of different kinds of rice, and I'll probably continue working my way through those for the time being. But eventually, sure, this would make as good a staple as any.

Trader Joe's Basmati Rice From India

Nina bought this and cooked some up as part of a dinner at her house. It was excellent--as good as any white rice I've ever had.

It comes in a strange bag, though. The resealable opening is not at the top, as on every other resealable plastic bag I've ever seen. Instead, it's about a third of the way down. This makes it stupidly awkward to pour out of. I cannot imagine why anybody thought this was a good idea.

Will I buy it again? 

Sure--but I'll probably empty it into a plain resealable food-storage bag as soon as it has been opened, to avoid wrestling with the idiotic bag design.

Nina's View

I have now cooked this basmati rice numerous times with excellent results. My excellent friend from India has pronounced her approval of this rice as being of very high quality. That's good enough for me.

Trader Joe's Organic Brown Rice & Quinoa Spaghetti Pasta

We're up to Day 5 of Gluten-Free Week on the blog: 



I thought this looked interesting when I saw it in the store, though not interesting enough that I cooked it up right away. It actually sat in my cupboard for several months before I got around to it.

I didn't think it was great, but it was perfectly acceptable. When eaten with pasta sauce, I was not consciously aware that it was significantly different from ordinary pasta. Maybe a little stickier and gloppier.

Most of the gluten-free substitutes for wheat-based products that I have tried have been pretty bad, such that if I were forced for health reasons to change to them, I would feel severely put upon. Not so with this one. I would deem it only a small diminishment in my enjoyment of spaghetti.

Will I buy it again? 

I doubt it. But if you have a problem with gluten, by all means give it a try.

Nina's View

When Bob told me that this was on the menu, I'm afraid my first reaction was "Oh dear." This was my polite way of saying what the inside of my head was screaming, which was "AW HELL NAWS!!!!!"

To be fair, it wasn't as bad as I expected. If you are truly gluten-sensitive or have celiac disease, I think this is worth trying. For the majority of us lucky enough to have no problem digesting gluten or wheat, there's no reason to inflict this on ourselves. I found the texture and taste pretty leaden. I think you need to pick your sauce for this carefully, as it will definitely clash with some flavors. I have no interest in experimenting to find which ones work best.

Trader Joe's Sea Salt & Pepper Crisps Made With Rice

These were surprisingly good. They're light, tasty, and loaded with just the right amount of salt and pepper.

The main problem with them is the size. They're small--kind of dainty. This isn't a problem for eating them straight, but it is for dipping. You can't get enough stuff on them. Trader Joe's needs to produce these in a larger size. They would make a superior vehicle for hummus, especially the plainer varieties.

Will I buy it again? 

Yes.

Nina's View

I like these, too. I have no objection to their size; in fact, I think it's excellent. One can get a little bit of dip on the chip and then pop the whole thing in one's mouth, if so inclined. They are also very nice just on their own.

Trader Joe's Peruvian Style Chimichurri Rice With Vegetables

A friend in Minnesota suggested that I try this stuff. I had single servings of it with lunch a couple of times before finally including it in a dinner with Nina. I was ambivalent about the product from my first bite, and remain so still. Here's why.

The good: It's super easy to prepare--just dump some in a bowl and zap it, without even needing to add water. It's extremely zesty, and thus makes a nice offset to a main dish that is on the bland side. In the instant case, it was scrambled eggs and a very mild fake sausage, which needed to be paired with something eye-opening.

The bad: I think they went too far in spiciness. They not only did an end run around the Trader Joe's Blandification Committee, but then spiked the ball and victory-danced in the end zone. It is presumably the cilantro and panca pepper paste that is responsible here.

The ugly: It has "shallots," which is clearly a Communist plot to sneak onions into things without calling them "onions."

I guess the bottom line is that I think it's interesting and pretty good without being "must-have" exceptional. I still have reservations about it.

I think I might like this better if I diluted it about 1:1 with some plain white rice. Maybe I'll try that with the next bag. My Minnesota friend said that one of his family's favorite easy recipes is this to dump this rice into some TJ's tomato-red pepper soup. That might be interesting to try, too, as that soup is very mild for balance.

Here's a random review I found, from someone who is obviously a big fan of the stuff, just to give you another opinion.

Will I buy it again? 

Probably. Nina seemed to like it a lot, and I like making her happy.

Nina's View

The chimichurri rice, it is verri [sic] yummy. I like the idea of putting it in the tomato/red-pepper soup, especially now that cold weather is upon is. I think it would also make a nice addition to a bean salad in the summertime.

Trader Joe's Basmati Rice Medley

OK, that is officially the worst product photo I've ever taken for this blog. My apologies.

I had never noticed this stuff on the shelves at Trader Joe's. Nina bought it and served it as part of a dinner she made for us. She had also eaten it by herself at least once before that.

I'm now thoroughly convinced that within Trader Joe's there is a team of people who are assigned to sample new foods before they go into full-scale production, and remove every last shred of flavor from them. I imagine that they are called the Blandification Committee. They write terse memos to the product managers: "Too much salt!" "I can still taste a bit of chicken. Try again!" "You put some spices in this, didn't you? Remove them at once." "Marilyn, did you think we would not notice the hint of pepper here? You're fired."

Fortunately, there are some TJ's products that escape the Committee's scrutiny, perhaps for complicated reasons that would be revealed by the company's organizational chart. Sadly, this rice medley was not among them. In fact, it appears to have commanded the Committee's full attention.

You might ordinarily think that a blend of different types of rice--including some wild rice--combined with some stray dried vegetables, would cook up into something with a delightfully complex blend of tastes. Here, though, you would be wrong. Somehow, the Committee managed to take those ingredients and wring every last bit of interesting or subtle flavor out of the final product.

Will I buy it again? 

No. I'm glad I didn't even buy it once.

Trader Joe's Brown Basmati Rice

Nina got me an Oster rice cooker for Christmas. The idea is great: measure out some rice, fill the pot with water to the specified level, flip it on, walk away, and it tells you when it has cooked you a batch of perfect rice.

In actual practice, this has not been my experience. As the appliance's owner's manual makes clear in the fine print, for any particular kind of rice, the right amount of water may be more or less than their default pot markings indicate, and the amount of time the thing automatically goes for may not be right. You may need to keep it on the "warm" setting for a while after the cook time. (On my particular model, the thing unfortunately doesn't beep or otherwise let you know it's finished cooking and has switched itself to "warm"; you have to be in the room with it to hear the switch move, or you'll miss the allegedly perfect time to remove the rice.) The instructions also say to be sure to rinse the rice very thoroughly before starting in order to remove excess starch and reduce stickiness. I also discovered that if I don't occasionally remove the lid and stir the rice, particularly in the last few minutes of cooking, the outside layer sticks to the pot (despite its non-stick coating), creating an unappetizing and sometime inedible crusty/sticky/starchy outer shell. I've been experimenting with these variables, and still don't feel that I have the formula perfected.

I bought this rice to continue my experimentation after going through a bag of TJ's Basmati White Rice.  (The photo above is not a full bag. I had already done several batches before I got the idea to create this blog.) At the time, I didn't understand that brown rice is notorious for being even more difficult to get right, requiring a whole different set of parameters (water level and cook time) than white rice. Also, Nina has been trying to convince me, in her firm but gentle way, that rice should be left to cook without the lid ever being removed, and without pre-rinsing. This creates tension between her usually excellent cooking advice and what I read in the rice cooker's instructions (about rinsing), and my experience about the crustiness problem if there is no stirring.

Because of my inexperience and attempts to juggle all of these variables and conflicting advice, my results have still not been ideal. Some batches have been OK, some undercooked, some overcooked, some sticky messes.

All of which makes it really difficult for me to come up with a sensible opinion about the quality of the rice itself.

Still, I can offer these observations: (1) Even my best batches have not been any better in taste or texture than the Basmati White Rice. (2) It is definitely more difficult to get the variables exactly right for this stuff than the white.

As a consequence, it's not likely I'll try this again--at least not until after I'm sure I feel I have mastered the formula for some easier-to-prepare variety.

Will I buy it again? 

Probably not.


Nina's View 

The last batch Bob made of the Brown Basmati was *this* close to being right. Just a tad too much water, I think, so it was a little mushy instead of fluffy. I think it's got a good flavor, and I'd be curious to try cooking it the conventional way myself one time, just to see.

The Oster rice cooker was, I confess, the most *cough* economical model available, and I suspect seriously set back Bob's rice preparation skills—although my intention was to make it easy and pleasant, the thing is just not very good or sophisticated. I am heartily sorry for making this whole business MORE not LESS aggravating.