Trader Joe's 100% Cranberry Juice Not From Concentrate

Nina and I often differ widely in our opinions of various Trader Joe's products. But in one category, we have had considerable accord: juices. Specifically, most of the juice blends in the big jugs have been pretty dismal. Conversely, TJ's single-ingredient pure juices have almost all been outstanding.

This one continues that trend. 100% cranberry juice is not for everyone. There are no sweeteners here to soften the blow, no raspberry or grape or apple to meld harmoniously with the tart cran. Nope. Drinking this is like taking a shot of whiskey, or chugging a cup of strong, black coffee--it'll wake you up and grow hair on your chest.

This is absolutely the real deal, with only one item on the list of ingredients: juice from whole cranberries. It's not even reconstituted from concentrate, though they do pasteurize it so that you don't come down with, I dunno, brucellosis or something and sue them.

I like this stuff. It's not something I'd want to have every day, but once in a while as a break from the milder, sweeter things, it's refreshingly bracing, like the cold slap in the face of those old Mennen commercials.





Thanks. I needed that.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes. Good stuff.

Nina's View

Pour a glass. Admire the deep ruby hue. And then brace yourself. 

I believe the first word out of my mouth after I sipped this was "Yowza!" It is not kid stuff. Bob is right to compare it to a shot of liquor—it's that intense. You will not want to glug this stuff. You'll sip it, catch your breath, and sip it again.

You might also chose to use it to blend with other juices, or in cocktails, or even in a sauce reduction.

Trader Joe's Cookie Thins--Triple Ginger

Given how much I liked the two other varieties in this cookie line--Meyer lemon and toasted coconut--there was little doubt that I would like these, too. The only question was, how much?

The answer: a lot.

Because of my impaired sense-memory, I couldn't be sure whether I liked them more or less than what I consider the all-time TJ's cookie champion, Triple Ginger Snaps, so I decided that I would just have to make the sacrifice for my readers of buying and eating another tub of the latter, so that I could sample the two contenders side by side. The things I have to do for you people!

After doing so, I still can't decide which I like better. They're as different as two ginger cookies could be. These are light, thin, and delicate. The Triple Ginger Snaps are thick, kind of tough, and in-your-face with their ramped-up ginger flavor and hunks of actual chewy ginger. They're completely different approaches to making a ginger cookie--almost polar opposites. But going back and forth between them, I couldn't find a clear preference. They're both just superb in their own ways.

Therefore, since I like them just as much as the reigning champion, they must be inducted into my Top Ten list (which, as regular readers know by now, is not limited to ten items).


Will I buy it again? 

Yes.

Trader Joe's Organic Pasta--Vegetable Radiatore

If this pasta tastes any different from any other, it is beyond my meager ability to appreciate. The only reason to buy it, then, is that it's pretty, and different from most plates of pasta that you usually serve. That's probably reason enough once in a while, though not as a regular thing.


Will I buy it again? 

Some day, sure.

Trader Joe's Blueberry Breakfast Biscuits

These "biscuits" are a puzzling thing. They're certainly nothing like what is conjured up in the typical American mind by the word "biscuits." I'm not sure they're even what would be conjured up in the typical British mind by their very different use of the same word, though it would be a closer match.

They're like thin blueberry cookies, but with an unusually strong grain-like flavor. I'm not sure if that is attributable to the rye or the oats (the "biscuits" contain both, second and third on the list of ingredients, respectively), or maybe the combination. But whatever is doing it, the result is a powerful cereal-y/granola-y accompaniment to what is otherwise a nice, distinct blueberry flavor.

And, for me, that's what keeps these from being something I'll want again. They feel too dessertish to be a good breakfast food, and too breakfastish to be a dessert.


Will I buy it again? 

No.

Nina's View

I liked these quite a bit. The best part is that the blueberry flavor tastes genuine. I enjoyed them with a glass of soy milk and with coffee.

Trader Joe's Riced Cauliflower

If this looks like a product we've reviewed before, well, it kinda is, kinda isn't. Trader Joe's now has not one but two "riced cauliflower" products. The first to come out was this frozen organic one. Later, they brought out the one you see here--not organic, and refrigerated rather than frozen. $2.49 per bag.

It was released a couple of months ago, but I could never find it in my local TJ's until this week. I suspect the reason is that the paleo diet people, when they find either of the two products, buy it all up. Following the #TraderJoes hashtag on Twitter, I frequently see comments about the store being out of riced cauliflower again, or squealing with delight at finally finding it in stock, or stories of people fighting over the last bag available, or bragging about buying a whole freezer's worth of it. As far as I know, these two products are the only things for which TJ's outlets routinely impose purchase restrictions--usually a two-bags-per-customer limit.

Here are a couple of typical examples just from the past several days:

One recent article I found compared the two TJ's products with two methods of preparing your own riced cauliflower. They concluded that the TJ's frozen was better than the refrigerated.

I beg to differ. I thought this stuff was much better than the frozen--at least it's better than my memory of the frozen, which admittedly may be in error. I suppose the easiest way to phrase it is that this stuff tasted like good cauliflower, while the frozen tasted like mediocre cauliflower. To be sure, that may well reflect more of a batch-to-batch variation than any intrinsic difference, but that was my experience with one sample of each.


Will I buy it again? 

No. As I said in the first review, if I want cauliflower, I'll have cauliflower, and if I want rice, I'll have rice. Because I do not stand in mortal fear of carbohydrates, I have no reason to have one masquerade as the other.

Roundup

This is my weekly compilation of news and other links related to Trader Joe's.


Important: Trader Joe's announces recall of frozen vegetables

Excellent NPR background reporting on the listeria outbreak/recall here

A second listeria-related recall: broccoli slaw/kale/chicken salad

Third listeria-related recall of the week: frozen corn

Rainier Beach neighborhood makes a web commercial to lure Trader Joe's

Why Whole Foods's CEO envies Trader Joe's

Trader Joe's best frozen meals, according to employees

"Let's Talk TJ's" podcast #23



Best tweets of the week:

1.

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4.

And finally, in lieu of the usual cute cat in a Trader Joe's grocery bag, here's a cute dog playing with a Trader Joe's grocery bag:

Trader Joe's Raspberry Sorbet

Nina bought this. I ate some at her house, but forgot to take a picture of it, so took this one in the store.

I thought it was quite good, but not spectacular. Put another way, it's what I would expect from store-bought sorbet, but not as good as I expected Trader Joe's to make it, after falling in love with some of their other frozen desserts.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes.

Nina's View

I keep going to Trader Joe's and looking for the pomegranate sorbet [Bob notes: sherbet] and not finding it. I bought this because what could go wrong? And nothing did, it was fine. But it was not POMEGRANATE SORBET.

Last time I went to TJ's not only did they not have the aforemention Po. Me. Gran. Ate. sorbet, they didn't have ANY sorbet.

End times, people. End times.