A trip to "Trader Joe's"
As most readers here know, Trader Joe's is an offbeat grocery store chain with locations now in only nine states. There are 21 here in the NY metro area , all just built in the last three years. It's a private firm, no franchises, so this is not an investment comment. It's a consumer comment.
Started in California in the 1950's as a stand alone store called Pronto, it grew slowly and in the '70's changed its name to that of its founder, Trader Joe as he was called. He sourced the many unusual products that were almost always branded under the Trader Joe's name. Hawaiian shirts worn by employees were the norm, and still are.
Some may see it as a competitor of Whole Foods but it is quite different. They are smaller stores and make no effort to serve every standard grocery store need. Their meat and vegetable sections are relatively small, but focused mainly on the organic side of products. You can choose to buy a six dollar chicken that is somewhat organic for $6 or a pristinely and faultlessly organic free ranged brined one of the same size for $16, so there are choices for those, like myself, who have loopholes in their dedication to culinary authenticity.
Our closest Trader Joe's is about a 15 to 20 minute drive away, but conveniently located in a strip mall that has one of the iconic New York "Shake Shack" hot dog and hamburger joints, is also just a half mile away from the unusually entertaining Costco, and a four mile drive down Old Country Road in Westbury to a family owned Columbian diner with great food, reasonable prices, a thoroughly mixed crowd, and welcoming service. It's one of our favorites, no frills, all good.
So going to Trader Joe's is generally an outing with other desired destinations as well. Back to Trader Joe's itself, it's difficult to describe. The aisles are large and not crowded and the store is reasonably small by supermarket standards. One thing that stands out is that the product selection is always changing. There are certain staples of their brands that are always there, but there are ones that disappear and new ones always on display. Most of their food is of the healthy variety but they still have things like "Ode to the Classic Potato Chip", that appeal to me in a big way, but with no preservatives, artificial flavors, or colors. Still the reliable salt and some oil for sure though. There is also Organic Popcorn cooked in olive oil, organic white corn tortilla chips, and the I guess dangerously tasty dark chocolate chip and almond cookies, safe as something like that can be but no weight watcher choice. All can keep me company during the college basketball games that I sporadically watch at the moment.
Younger daughter accidentally left her flexible black leather boots here on a recent visit and the USPS postal one price box left plenty of room so we went to Trader Joe's fill it out(it's arguably her favorite food store). We sent maple praline granola, dried pineapple slices, a large bag of individual small packs of unsalted almonds to take around to classes for energy, freeze dried strawberries, a packet of mixed blueberries, cherrys, and mangos that were just regular dried and ready to eat, and who knows what else. For once, as things go these days, she liked everything that we sent. Kudos to Trader Joe's.
From this perspective, somewhat like Costco, I like the fact that there are always new things, the unexpected. The healthy cereal selection is terrific, all of the organic canned beans and soups are cheap as can be(well below Whole Foods) and healthy, and their dark chocolate covered raisins can go into pretend world as being healthy and their tasty inexpensive tartar sauce probably cannot. We eat lots of fish these days as cholestoral and blood pressure can be concerns and we have generally found that we have lost our taste for steak, prime rib, and big sirloin burgers except on special occasions.
Once again I've exhausted a subject. Even if you are not in one of their nine states, you can go to Trader Joe's website and get on their once a month "Fearless Flyer" list and get information on their current offerings as well as plenty of good information on good healthy foods in general.
Postcript, 3/25 --- I should have noted that one of Trader Joe's new surprise offerings is coffee, never seen there, tins of beans from Columbia and Costa Rica, their advertising on the tins suggesting special places. For those of us now accustomed to Starbucks dense taste and the low prices at Costco for that and for their Kirkland brand which is also a byproduct of Starbucks, these new coffees may be a revelation. We bought one, Costa Rica Terrazu, last week and it has the same expected effect of coffee but a much more interesting taste than Starbuck, no burnt taste, no heavy taste, a really welcome change that I now look forward to in the morning. Tastes change, this may change, but choice is a good thing. I'm heading back for more today before they change their selection.
Started in California in the 1950's as a stand alone store called Pronto, it grew slowly and in the '70's changed its name to that of its founder, Trader Joe as he was called. He sourced the many unusual products that were almost always branded under the Trader Joe's name. Hawaiian shirts worn by employees were the norm, and still are.
Some may see it as a competitor of Whole Foods but it is quite different. They are smaller stores and make no effort to serve every standard grocery store need. Their meat and vegetable sections are relatively small, but focused mainly on the organic side of products. You can choose to buy a six dollar chicken that is somewhat organic for $6 or a pristinely and faultlessly organic free ranged brined one of the same size for $16, so there are choices for those, like myself, who have loopholes in their dedication to culinary authenticity.
Our closest Trader Joe's is about a 15 to 20 minute drive away, but conveniently located in a strip mall that has one of the iconic New York "Shake Shack" hot dog and hamburger joints, is also just a half mile away from the unusually entertaining Costco, and a four mile drive down Old Country Road in Westbury to a family owned Columbian diner with great food, reasonable prices, a thoroughly mixed crowd, and welcoming service. It's one of our favorites, no frills, all good.
So going to Trader Joe's is generally an outing with other desired destinations as well. Back to Trader Joe's itself, it's difficult to describe. The aisles are large and not crowded and the store is reasonably small by supermarket standards. One thing that stands out is that the product selection is always changing. There are certain staples of their brands that are always there, but there are ones that disappear and new ones always on display. Most of their food is of the healthy variety but they still have things like "Ode to the Classic Potato Chip", that appeal to me in a big way, but with no preservatives, artificial flavors, or colors. Still the reliable salt and some oil for sure though. There is also Organic Popcorn cooked in olive oil, organic white corn tortilla chips, and the I guess dangerously tasty dark chocolate chip and almond cookies, safe as something like that can be but no weight watcher choice. All can keep me company during the college basketball games that I sporadically watch at the moment.
Younger daughter accidentally left her flexible black leather boots here on a recent visit and the USPS postal one price box left plenty of room so we went to Trader Joe's fill it out(it's arguably her favorite food store). We sent maple praline granola, dried pineapple slices, a large bag of individual small packs of unsalted almonds to take around to classes for energy, freeze dried strawberries, a packet of mixed blueberries, cherrys, and mangos that were just regular dried and ready to eat, and who knows what else. For once, as things go these days, she liked everything that we sent. Kudos to Trader Joe's.
From this perspective, somewhat like Costco, I like the fact that there are always new things, the unexpected. The healthy cereal selection is terrific, all of the organic canned beans and soups are cheap as can be(well below Whole Foods) and healthy, and their dark chocolate covered raisins can go into pretend world as being healthy and their tasty inexpensive tartar sauce probably cannot. We eat lots of fish these days as cholestoral and blood pressure can be concerns and we have generally found that we have lost our taste for steak, prime rib, and big sirloin burgers except on special occasions.
Once again I've exhausted a subject. Even if you are not in one of their nine states, you can go to Trader Joe's website and get on their once a month "Fearless Flyer" list and get information on their current offerings as well as plenty of good information on good healthy foods in general.
Postcript, 3/25 --- I should have noted that one of Trader Joe's new surprise offerings is coffee, never seen there, tins of beans from Columbia and Costa Rica, their advertising on the tins suggesting special places. For those of us now accustomed to Starbucks dense taste and the low prices at Costco for that and for their Kirkland brand which is also a byproduct of Starbucks, these new coffees may be a revelation. We bought one, Costa Rica Terrazu, last week and it has the same expected effect of coffee but a much more interesting taste than Starbuck, no burnt taste, no heavy taste, a really welcome change that I now look forward to in the morning. Tastes change, this may change, but choice is a good thing. I'm heading back for more today before they change their selection.
posted by John Borden at 9:26 AM
3 Comments:
What is the name of the Columbian diner?
The name is in Spanish but has "pollo" in it, meaning chicken as you know. It's on the north side of Old Country Road east of the strip mall that has an Outback Steakhouse in it. It brightly painted with lots of lights around it. Parking can be a challenge but eventually found.
Their two new or temporary coffee choices are so good, espcially the Costa Rican one - not cheap compared to Costco, but makes getting up in the morning initiative be sprigthly.
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