regrettable shopping experiences
I went to Trader Joe’s a couple of days ago. It was a wholly unsatisfying experience. They have a real quality-control problem. Some days everything they have for sale is really good and some days you just get shit. I don’t mean the fresh stuff, I’m talking the frozen or pre-made foods. Some are good and some are not worthy of being fed to dogs as their last meal before getting that final IV in the back of the city pound.
I bought the following:
1. Vegetable shu mai. Terrible. Rubbery, looked raw even though it was cooked, unappetizing all around. The picture on the box was great, but THEY LIE. Grade: D-
2. Hummus. It’s okay but I’ve had better. Grade: C
3. Gingerbread cookies covered with chocolate. Sounds like they’d be REALLY good but these have a layer of what I assume is technically marzipan but which in reality looks and tastes like cardboard. That thin white cardboard that comes in a package of stockings. I hate marzipan anyway but when it cannot be immediately identified as “not cardboard,” then you know there’s a real problem with it. Grade: D-
4. Sushi. I never should have gotten this. We have a lot of good sushi places here in Boston and I don’t know what possessed me to buy pre-made sushi from a grocery store. I thought, how bad could it be? WELL IT COULD BE WORSE THAN YOU MIGHT EVER THINK. It’s not that it was rotten, but sushi is not meant to be bought and made and put in a plastic box for later. You’re supposed to watch the guy cut it, roll it, chop it, arrange it prettily on your plate, and then you eat it. Immediately. No saving for later. Grade: A Big Fat Fucking Capital F.
Actually I wrote the above about 3 hours ago and the thought of that terrible sushi I had made me want good sushi so I went to an actual Japanese restaurant for lunch and had some and it was magnificent. So the painful memory of Trader Joe’s substandard product has somewhat been eradicated.