Trader Joe's French Apple Tart and Trader Joe's Teeny Tiny Apple Pies

On our last Trader Joe's run, we might have overbought a little, and I don't think there's any way to review all of these goodies before Christmas. So in the interest of consolidating our blog posts, this edition will serve to compare and contrast two popular apple pie products available this holiday season: Trader Joe's French Apple Tart and Trader Joe's Teeny Tiny Apple Pies.

The first and most obvious difference between the two products is the presence of enormous apple slices on the French tart. They're both Granny Smith and Northern Spy varieties. Some of you might recall the legendary Rustic Apple Tarte employed the use of Northern Spies. It's a lightly sweet and juicy species, while Granny Smith is tart and crisp. The teeny tiny pies are filled with a more traditional apple pie filling, with very small minced pieces of fruit—again using Northern Spy apples from Canada.

Flavor-wise, the French pie not only flaunts some sour apple pieces, but it uses apricot bits as well, lending it even more sweet-tart tang. The teeny tiny iteration boasts more of a cinnamon and brown sugar flavor and a much sweeter filling blend.

As far as crust goes, the teeny tiny apple pies have a traditional apple pie crust on the sides and bottom with an apple crumble-style coating on top. The tart is much less reliant on breading with nothing but a modest layer of shortbread underneath the layers of apple and apricot. There was an odd grittiness to the shortbread on the French apple tart that was just a tad off-putting.

Value-wise, we're looking at four servings in each of the products, though Sonia and I both agree you could easily stretch the French apple tart to eight servings. However, at $7.99, it's also pricier. The teeny tiny fellows will run you five bucks for the quartet of mini pies.

In the end, the French apple tart tastes more natural, and it'll serve a greater number of people, at least potentially. The teeny tiny apple pies have a very safe, classic apple pie flavor with cinnamon and brown sugar, they offer three different heating options right on the box (while the French tart includes none). The grainy texture in the French tart's shortbread bothered me a little more than Sonia, but she did notice it. Here are our final scores:

Trader Joe's French Apple Tart            Trader Joe's Teeny Tiny Apple Pies
Nathan: 3.5 stars                                  Nathan: 4 stars
Sonia: 4.5 stars                                    Sonia: 4 stars
Bottom line: 8 out of 10.                    Bottom line: 8 out of 10.

And if you're still on the fence about which purchase to make and you don't want to try one of each, we offer this last bit of guidance: if you're a family of four or less, go with the teeny tiny pies. If you're a family of five or more, go with the French tart.

Trader Joe's Raspberry Croissant Carré

All right, we did our obligatory vegetable-based product yesterday, so it's time to get back to indulgent, fattening holiday treats. I mean, it's practically the weekend. Up next: this raspberry croissant pastry thing. I've never heard of carré before. Apparently, it means "square" in French. Pronounced like "car-ray."

Only conventional oven heating instructions are given on the packaging, but we winged it in the air fryer on low heat (325°F) for about five minutes. It worked. The pastry was still soft, flaky, and buttery on the outside—like a croissant—and the filling was nice and hot, smooth and sweet, like the center of a high-quality jelly doughnut.

The filling is made with real raspberries and lemon juice, so it tastes authentic and fruity. It's mostly sweet, but there's a nice dose of tart flavor in there, too. 

The edges of the pastry favor the bread quite a bit, while the middle is positively bursting with the purple jam. Both elements are delicious and pair beautifully with one another as a fancy and festive French dessert treat.

$5.99 for the six serving loaf. I don't even know if this is an explicitly Christmassy thing. Raspberries are kinda summer fruits, no? I'm sure they could make this with apples, oranges, figs, or plums and it would still be interesting to try.

Anyway, we would definitely buy again next year. Four stars from me. Four and a half stars from the beautiful wifey for Trader Joe's Raspberry Croissant Carré.

Bottom line: 8.5 out of 10.