Trader Joe's is selling the good stuff now. And it's not just any hash, it's a special strain cultivated for this magical holiday season. But try as I may to roll it up and light it up, I just couldn't get this bud to burn. Somebody gotta tell Joe to dry his goods before selling them. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to eat these little hash chunks. They even give you suggestions for using them as edibles right on the package. You can make super stimulating soup or stoner stuffing with this stuff. Far out.
All hash jokes aside, our mixture seemed like it was teetering on the verge of being too dry, honestly. A bit more moisture would have been quite pleasant here. The squash and sweet potato bites were a little too hard and even the celery seemed stiff. We did consume it a couple days before the "best by" date, but it seemed like maybe our batch had seen better days..?
It's not a mix I'd ever want to eat on its own. In addition to the lack of moisture and abundance of firmness, it's a very odd flavor combo to me. When cold, the onions clash with the sweet potato and squash, and the herbs and spices are overrepresented.
As far as seasonings are concerned, we're looking at parsley, sage, rosemary, and...wait. What? Just parsley, sage, rosemary...and no thyme. I bet Simon and Garfunkel are rolling over in their graves right now. Wait. What? Neither of those guys are dead yet? Well, that's good, I guess. Time for a reunion tour then, maybe?
The beautiful wifey has big plans to serve up the remainder of our hash with a Cornish hen, but I don't think we'll get to that before this review gets posted. In light of how good this stuff is when served as a hot dish, I'll have to give it the benefit of the doubt. Sonia agrees.
$4.99 for the 18 oz container. Three and a half stars a piece from the wifey and me for Trader Joe's Holiday Vegetable Hash.
I'm definitely an ice cream-all-year-round kinda guy. Most of my life, I've lived in places with four seasons. Ice cream in December might make sense to Southern Californians, but it might not be the norm for folks in the Mid-Atlantic or Upper Midwest.
Actually, I take that back. In my hometown in central Pennsylvania, there'd be folks in line for ice cream at The Igloo all throughout the winter months. And the Berkey Creamery at Penn State never closed even in the freezing cold. I guess it's just part of the culture when you live in places surrounded by dairy farms.
At any rate, we never shy away from newfangled ice cream from Trader Joe's even if it's cold outside, so let's dig in. The actual ice cream here is gingerbread flavored. There are also nice big pieces of ginger cookies and a molasses-esque "gingerbread swirl." I think a vanilla base would have worked a little better here than the spicy brown base they used. A bit more creamy and sweet would have helped put the ginger spices in check, in the manner of Cookie Butter Ice Cream.
Still, this is a decent ice cream flavor, particularly if you love gingerrific ginger snaps. Every few bites or so, we got a piece of powerful, sinus-clearing raw ginger. I didn't really mind it since it wasn't in every bite. There were enough sweet and desserty elements that the raw ginger bits helped to balance them out, and they blended well with the molasses, cinnamon, and nutmeg flavors.
$3.79 for the pint. In summary, this ice cream is a festive, high quality, specialty dessert. It'll hit the spot for folks that absolutely love ginger. For other folks like Sonia and me, it was fun to try just once, but we'll return to vanilla-based ice creams that balance out the ginger spices a little better in the future. Three and a half stars a piece from the beautiful wifey and me for Trader Joe's Gingerbread Ice Cream.
Neither Sonia nor I grew up with bread pudding, but we've reviewed a couple versions from Trader Joe's throughout the years. See: pumpkin and salted caramel varieties.
This hot new product looked buzzworthy, so we decided to embark on another bread pudding adventure. After a bit of full-contact Christmas shopping over the weekend, Sonia and I were both getting hangry and teetering on the verge of a full blown verbal sparring session as we arrived at home, so we took the shortest path to raising our blood sugar back to normal-ish levels by yoinking this product from the freezer and popping the little desserts in the microwave.
The results? Quite decent. Forty-five seconds never tasted so scrumptious. A few bites of the sticky sweet concoction had us laughing and smiling like our normal, good-natured selves again.
The bread pudding is glazed in a pleasant amount of a salty caramel sauce that keeps the product sticky and syrupy. The flavor is sweet and buttery. The texture: soft, wet, and doughy.
The product wasn't even a bit chewy or rubbery even after a spell in the microwave. The bread does seem a bit firmer and puffier than your average bread pudding bread—perhaps because it's bread from actual pretzels. Has this been a thing for a while? Why didn't anybody tell me about this?
$4.49 for two very filling dessert cups. Good stuff here. Worth a purchase. Would eat for dessert after Christmas dinner. The beautiful wifey is on board for four and a half stars. Put me down for another four and a half and a thumbs up for Trader Joe's Pretzel Bread Pudding.
