Dara Moskowitz on SLP Trader Joe’s
She lost me after the first paragraph, so I skimmed the rest. I gather she went and shopped and then goes home and analyzes the contents of her bags. Oh, and it was a bit of a madhouse inside. Probably just the huge influx left the shelves picked a little clean, but I have an image of grups and hipsters and soccer moms alike wrestling and pulling hair over the last something-organic-and-free-trade. The presence of TwoThree-Buck Chuck has been confirmed.
Then there’s this at the end:
My other particularly Minnesotan thought on it all is: Trader Joe’s is actually not as much like one of the local co-ops, or like Byerly’s, Lunds, or Kowalski’s, as it is like…SuperAmerica. A really upscale SuperAmerica. Which I suppose hearkens back to Trader Joe’s origins as a convenience store. In fact, once upon a time, in college, I had a summer roommate who ended most of his days with a frozen pizza and 12-pack of 3.2 from SA. It occurred to me that said ex-roommate could now get 10 times better quality, at the exact same price, from Trader Joe’s.
I’m not sure what to make of this, having only been inside a Trader Joe’s once m’self. I’m puzzled, I guess. I’m not generally a Byerly’s/Lunds/Kowalski’s patron. 90% of that is because I live a block from Rainbow. But, you know, I’m not used to being able to afford those froo froo grocery items. And I don’t know what to do with them. So maybe Trader Joe’s is the happy medium I’m looking for. I’ll keep scratching my head over it until one day, probably on my way home from work, I’ll pull over at the last second and turn in on impulse.
Pull over and try out the “two-buck” chuck. They have a great selection of foods, frozen and fresh and I love their produce. I’ll buy cases of wine for parties and even end up schlepping some “down-home” for others not fortunate enough to live nearby a TJs.
I wish Three Buck Chuck actually tasted good. I will say it is an improvement over Yellow Tail, but that really isn’t saying much. I can’t complain, though. It is getting people to drink wine who never have before. Some day they will come to me wanting something better. I will be there for them while they transition through this awkward time :)
Trader Joe’s has been good to me so far (I appreciate all of the readily-available vegetarian options, though wish they had more organic/free-range meat since that’s the only kind I’ll eat these days), though I think it can be hit-or-miss.
Hits so far (not including stuff that is difficult to mess up, such as raisins): whole wheat pizza dough, plain ol’ tortilla chips, roasted garlic salsa, goat cheese crumbles, fresh mozarella (TJ’s brand), chunk mozarella (also TJ’s brand, I believe), TJ’s brand marinara, vegetarian “meat”balls, Pizza Olympiad (frozen with feta, roasted red peppers, olives, etc.)
Misses: frozen NY-style cheesecake, bake-at-home French bread (it was moldy two days after I bought it, and had no expiration date on it; I wonder how long it took to get onto the shelves), produce (it’s kind of lackluste - the organic stuff doesn’t have the more-intense organic flavor I’m used to)
It’s certainly worth checking out. I’ve came away with a nice amount of groceries for around $40 each time I’ve visited.
Tipper is right. The hand-held baskets have a magical power. You throw whatever food you want in and your total rarely comes to over $40.
Dara’s suggestion that Trader Joe’s is a convenience store isn’t too far off. Most people in So. Cal use the store as a supplement to another grocery store. 99% of their best stuff is ready to cook.
I knew Nate would have an opinion on the Two Buck Chuck.
I finally stopped by there the other day. And picked up a whole bunch of ready-to-eat-or-heat-up-real-quick stuff. The experience was good. (Except the Mango Apricot fake Cheerios I got were gross. I should know by now that no one else’s “Cheerios” are EVER as good as the originals.)
As for the convenience store thing, I can easily see stopping in there and just picking up a couple things for dinner (since it’s on my way home).
I asked my cashier if it had been pretty busy and she said that the time that I was there (5:30-ish on Wednesday) was unusually dead (it wasn’t dead in there at all). She asked if I could find everything okay, because they’ve really had trouble keeping stuff in stock, they’ve been so busy. I told her the bloggers had been all atwitter about this place and I had to come check it out. I couldn’t tell if she thought that was weird or not.
You throw whatever food you want in and your total rarely comes to over $40. — I just went (again) and tried to stuff my basket. The total: $37.11.